By JEFFREY GOLD
The Associated Press
Tuesday, March 13, 2007; 1:05 AM

NEWARK, N.J. -- Hertz Global Holdings Inc., the world's largest renter of cars, reported Monday night that it made a profit on record revenues in its first quarter since going public in November.

Hertz reported net income of $39.8 million, or 14 cents a share, for the three months ended Dec. 31. It said it would have reported a loss of $27.6 million, or 12 cents a share, for the same period a year earlier.

Wall Street expected quarterly earnings of 4 cents a share, according to a Thomson Financial survey.

Quarterly revenues were $1.99 billion, up 8 percent from the fourth quarter of 2005, the company said.

For 2006, the company earned $115.9 million, or 48 cents a share, compared with $47.2 million, or 21 cents a share, in 2005. Analysts anticipated earnings of 40 cents.

Revenues for 2006 were $8.06 billion, up 7.9 percent from 2005, the company said.

Hertz, which operates from about 7,600 locations in 145 countries, had expected to issue the earnings report shortly after markets closed Monday. Instead, it was released more than six hours after the closing. Company spokesman Richard Broome blamed problems in formatting tables so they could be viewed on a Web site.

Hertz Chairman and Chief Executive Mark P. Frissora credited strong cost management as a contributor to the results. The company reduced operating expenses _ mainly in U.S. car rental and equipment rental operations _ by more than two percentage points of revenues compared with the fourth quarter of 2005. Meanwhile, Hertz increased its investment in advertising by $6.6 million versus the prior year quarter.

"We also achieved solid revenue growth in both the car and equipment rental businesses, due to pricing improvements and increasingly diversified revenue sources," Frissora said in a written statement.

Layoffs announced in January and February should trim 5 percent from Hertz's global work force of 31,000, or about 1,550 people.

Hertz, based in Park Ridge, has endured a rocky four months since becoming a public company Nov. 16.

Less than two weeks later, Hertz shares dipped below $15, the price of its initial public offering. Then they steadily rose, peaking at $22.28, before sliding a bit over the past month.

Hertz shares closed Monday at $21.12, up 22 cents, or 1 percent, in regular trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The shares gained 5 cents to $21.17 in after-hours trading.

Hertz was acquired in December 2005 from Ford Motor Co. by the private equity firms Clayton, Dubilier & Rice Inc. and Carlyle Group, along with a unit of investment bank Merrill Lynch. They paid $2.3 billion in cash, borrowed more than $3 billion and assumed $10 billion in debt.

The owners used borrowed funds to pay themselves a $1 billion dividend, which helped push the company's total debt load to nearly $13 billion by the end of September.

The owners said they would collect an additional $425.5 million in one-time dividends after the IPO, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission registration statement. At the time of the IPO, they owned about three-quarters of the company's shares, worth about $3.9 billion.

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On the Net:

Hertz Global Holdings Inc.: http://www.hertz.com