Nu Skin Enterprises, Inc. announced today that the Tokyo District Court issued its ruling on a dispute between the company and Japan Customs. The District Court upheld previous assessments by Japan Customs of approximately $33 million in customs duties on the company's products from 2002 to 2005."We strongly disagree with the court's decision and are likely to appeal," said Ritch Wood, chief financial officer for Nu Skin. "As a result of this decision, however, we plan to take a charge of approximately $33 million this quarter. The charge is a non-cash item as the company was previously required to pay the assessments."
Given the recent natural disasters in Japan, the company also provided an update on the potential impact on its Japan operations.
"First and foremost, our hearts go out to those impacted in Japan," said Truman Hunt, president and chief executive officer. "Our primary concern is the safety of our sales leaders, staff and all those who have been affected by these disasters. Gratefully, we can report that all of our employees, as well as our top sales leaders are accounted for and we continue to reach out to all of our distributors in the heavily impacted areas."
"To support our distributors throughout Japan, our team has been working diligently to bring us back to a fully operational level. We have modified business hours to accommodate commuting delays for many of our employees. Product orders continue to be received and shipped to distributors and customers, with the exception of shipments to the most severely impacted areas, which account for less than 10 percent of our business in Japan.
"Because our sales leaders work to achieve sales targets on a monthly basis, we will have a clearer understanding of the impact of the natural disasters after the end of the month. As of today, we believe that the first-quarter negative impact on our Japan revenue will be approximately $3 to $5 million and $0.01 to $0.02 to earnings per share. We believe this first-quarter impact will largely be offset by strength from our other markets and favorable foreign currency moves. We will continue to provide transparency by issuing a high-level update on the company's first-quarter results by April 6," concluded Hunt.
