Fisher and Paykel Healthcare will bank $23 million in refunded United States tariffs this financial year, and has lifted its full year profit forecast on the strength of hospital demand.
The East Tāmaki respiratory device maker, the largest company on the New Zealand sharemarket, told the market before trading opened on Friday 21 August that it now expects net profit after tax of roughly $525 million to $565 million for the year ending 31 March 2027. That is up from the $500 million to $550 million range it gave shareholders in May. Operating revenue guidance was nudged to a range of about $2.47 billion to $2.57 billion, from $2.45 billion to $2.57 billion.
For the first half, which closes on 30 September, the company expects revenue of about $1.24 billion and net profit after tax of about $280 million. Set against the same six months last year, and leaving the tariff refunds out of the comparison, that is roughly 14 percent revenue growth and roughly 24 percent profit growth.
“We have had a strong start to our first half, particularly in our Hospital product group, as a result of continued strong demand for our latest range of hardware devices and ongoing change in clinical practice driving consumable sales,” managing director and chief executive Lewis Gradon said in the announcement.
“It is also pleasing to see the progress we are making with our continuous improvement activities and the impact on our gross margin and other operating efficiencies,” he said.
Hardware sales matter to the company well beyond the machines themselves. Every humidifier or nasal high flow unit placed in a hospital ward pulls along years of tubing, chambers and interfaces that have to be replaced constantly. That is the consumables trade Gradon is pointing at, and it is why an upgrade cycle in hardware tends to show up in the accounts long after the hardware itself is sold.
Shares rose more than 1 percent in both New Zealand and Australian trading on the day of the announcement.
The more unusual number in the announcement is the $23 million of refunded tariffs, which sits inside both the half year and the full year profit guidance. It is money the company already paid to United States Customs and is now getting back, and it is one of the first hard figures a New Zealand exporter has put on the board from a pool that could run to hundreds of millions of dollars.
The refunds trace back to February, when the United States Supreme Court struck down the tariffs President Donald Trump had imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the law known in trade circles as IEEPA. Those duties had been collected on New Zealand goods entering the United States from April 2025. The Court of International Trade then directed United States Customs and Border Protection to hand the money back, and the refunds began flowing from 20 April.
How much is owed to New Zealand firms in total is still an open question. Modelling published by EY New Zealand on 1 May put the pool at up to $1 billion across exporters of meat, dairy, fruit, wine, machinery, medical devices and instruments. Whether that money actually lands in New Zealand bank accounts is a different matter again.
“Our modelling shows there is a substantial pool of refunds potentially available to New Zealand exporters, but the ability to access those refunds will vary considerably depending on how individual supply chains and importing arrangements are structured,” EY New Zealand partner and indirect tax leader Paul Smith said at the time.
“Where exporters are not the importer of record and do not have control or influence over the importer, some refunds may ultimately be retained offshore,” Smith said.
That caveat is the whole game for most exporters. A refund goes to whoever paid the duty at the border. If a New Zealand meat company sells to an American distributor who clears the goods, the cheque goes to the distributor. Fisher and Paykel Healthcare sells into the United States through its own subsidiary, which is a large part of why it can name a figure and put it in its guidance while others are still working through contracts with their customers.
None of this means the tariff problem has gone away. Within hours of the Supreme Court ruling the White House reimposed duties under different legislation, and from 24 July a 12.5 percent additional tariff has applied to most New Zealand goods entering the United States under a Section 301 finding on forced labour. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade notes that countries which signed reciprocal trade agreements with Washington or committed to forced labour import bans were placed on a lower 10 percent rate, while New Zealand sits in the higher tier alongside 37 other economies. Beef and kiwifruit remain exempt, and about $100 million of other New Zealand exports have been carved out.
Separate steel and aluminium tariffs imposed under Section 232 were untouched by the court and remain in force. EY estimated those had cost New Zealand businesses about $172 million as at February.
Fisher and Paykel Healthcare’s exposure is complicated by where it makes things. In February 2025 the company told investors it manufactured about 45 percent of its volume in Mexico and about 55 percent in New Zealand, with roughly 60 percent of the product it sells into the United States coming out of its Tijuana plants. That split means the company has been managing several tariff regimes at once rather than one, and Friday’s guidance assumes current global tariff rates, policies and applications hold for the rest of the financial year.
The guidance is also struck at 31 July exchange rates of 59 United States cents, 51 euro cents and 10.17 Mexican pesos to the New Zealand dollar. A weak Kiwi flatters reported revenue for a company that earns most of its money offshore, and it is worth remembering that a decent slice of any upgrade at Fisher and Paykel Healthcare is currency rather than volume.
“Our progress reflects the momentum we are building across the business. We are continuing to innovate, supporting clinicians to adopt new ways of delivering care, and advancing projects needed to maintain that momentum into the future,” Gradon said.
Shareholders get their chance to put questions to the board at the company’s annual meeting, which is set down for 2pm on Tuesday 25 August with an online attendance option. Half year results are due in November.
What do you make of it. Should exporters be pushing harder to get their tariff refunds back from American importers, or is that money gone for good. Leave a comment below and tell us what you think.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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