MSC Industrial Direct Looks to Regain Pricing Power

The industrial recovery in the U.S. is in full swing, and the latest results from MSC Industrial Direct (NYSE: MSM) on Oct. 31 served to confirm the positive trend. However, it's not all smooth sailing. End demand has been picking up for a while, but so far the industrial supply company hasn't seen it feed through into margin expansion. The fourth-quarter earnings played out these themes, but management served notice that an improvement could be around the corner.

Here are the headline numbers from the quarter. (All figures exclude MSC's July purchase of DECO, an industrial-supply company.) 

It was a good quarter for MSC Industrial, and although underlying gross margin continued to decline, operating margin increased because of operating leverage -- a company's ability to grow profit from additional sales. 

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Source: Fool.com