Shares of Autobytel Inc., which links car buyers to dealers online, surged nearly 19% Tuesday on news that it named a chief financial officer and brought its past-due financial statements up-to-date.
The company said it named Michael Schmidt as Autobytel’s executive vice president and chief financial officer. The position had been open since Hoshi Printer resigned in November after accounting-related issues were discovered at the Irvine-based company.
Schmidt joined Autobytel in April 2004 as senior vice president in charge of finance. He initially was responsible for the company’s financial planning and analysis. In November, Schmidt took on the duties of chief financial officer without the title.
In filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Autobytel on Tuesday submitted restated reports for 2004 and its quarters ended Sept. 30, 2004 and March 31, 2005. The company also filed an amended quarterly report for its quarter ended June 30, 2004.
“This filing brings us current with the SEC,” said Rick Post, Autobytel’s chief executive. “These filings also give us full compliance with Nasdaq’s listing standards.”
The effort to get the restatements completed during the past three years was a “very tedious” process that was “time-consuming” for Autobytel’s management, Post said.
“When I came in a month ago, the first thing we said was that we had to get the restatements filed,” Post said. “Now we want to regain our momentum.”
The overall impact of the restated financial statements is a reduction of net income of $3.1 million, the company said in its SEC filing. In addition, the impact of errors on Autobytel’s balance sheet is a reduction of $800,000 in its stockholders’ equity at June 30, 2004.
Restatements for 2002 and 2003 are reflected in the company’s 2004 annual report, the company said. The restatements for Autobytel’s 2003 second fiscal quarter and second quarter of 2004 are reflected in its report for the quarter ended June 30, 2004.
The restatement of the third quarter of 2003 is reflected in the company’s filing for its third quarter ended Sept. 30, 2004, while restatement of the first quarter of 2004 is reflected in the quarter ended March 31.
Last week, a Nasdaq compliance panel gave Autobytel until May 31 to get its past-due financial reports filed, or else face delisting from the exchange.
In April, Post, who was an Autobytel board member, replaced outgoing chief executive Jeffrey Schwartz, who resigned.
Shares of Autobytel closed up 18.5% to $4.86 Tuesday.
