Question-and-Answer Session
Thank you Ms. Johnson. The question-and-answer session will be conducted electronically. [Operator Instructions]. And our first question comes from Brannon Cook from JPMorgan.
Brannon Cook - JPMorgan
Good morning.
Rhonda S. Johnson - Director of Investor Relations
Good morning.
Brannon Cook - JPMorgan
So, just...I had a question around the outlook in the railcar market. It looks like the utilization hung in there to pretty solid level in the fourth quarter. And looking at your guidance it seems that you have some confidence that you are going to be able to hold the railcar utilization in North American market. Could you give a little color around kind of your expectations there relative to the guidance you gave?
Robert C. Lyons - Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
Sure. Brannon, it's Bob Lyons, I can give you a quick summary of what we are thinking going forward. We are anticipating as we go through 2008 that there would be some deterioration in that utilization level. As the market continues to face challenges and specific car types and generally a weaker tone than what we experienced in 2007. But looking forward, we are not talking about levels that approached the early 2001, 2002 timeframe, where utilization dipped significantly. We are talking a couple of 100 basis points type.
Brannon Cook - JPMorgan
Okay. And it's kind of a follow-on to that. Can you talk a bit about...you talked about lower remarketing income in 08 versus 07. I guess in 07 you had around $61 million of remarketing income; in 06 it was $47 million. Should we think about the remarketing income coming in a bit more at the 06 level, meaningfully lower than we were in 07?
Robert C. Lyons - Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer
That's a more reasonable assumption, correct. We anticipate 2007 was exceptionally strong year as we took advantage of some opportunities in the marketplace, and we continued our fleet optimization in rail. So we are expecting some continuation of that in 2008, but not at the levels we experienced this year. So looking back at 2006, there is a more reasonable range.
Brannon Cook - JPMorgan
Okay. And just as a final question on asset purchase opportunities, clearly the overall railcar market is weakening a bit from railcar price perspective. Can you talk about...you obviously; you got the deal with Trinity, purchasing some railcars there. Could you talk a little bit about what you see in 08 in terms of opportunities? Are things getting to the point, where things are getting increasingly attractive to take advantage of some opportunistic transactions?
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