AutoNation warns cyberattack put a big dent in quarterly profit

AutoNation Inc., one of the biggest chains of US car dealerships, warned the cyberattack that crippled retailers across the country until early this month cost the company a significant chunk of second-quarter earnings.

The hack of CDK Global likely lowered AutoNation’s profit for the period by about $1.50 a share, the Fort Lauderdale, Florida-based company said in a regulatory filing Monday. The dealer group estimates it will earn in the range of $3.15 to $3.30 a share in the quarter on a generally accepted accounting principles basis.

The cyberattacks on CDK knocked the dealership management system provider’s main services offline for roughly two weeks, costing thousands of car retailers business around the Juneteenth and July 4 holidays, as well as the end-of-quarter sales push. While substantially all of CDK customers’ management systems were back online early this month, AutoNation said that certain ancillary services are still limited or unavailable, including those that help automate ordering, scheduling, payment and reporting processes.

AutoNation said it doesn’t expect the incident to have a material impact on its overall financial condition or ongoing results. The retailer’s shares rose 0.5% to $172.25 as of 9:42 a.m. in New York, recovering from a drop before the start of regular trading.