PEORIA, Ill. -- Caterpillar's first-quarter adjusted profit met Wall Street's view, even as sales declined across various categories while it continues to deal with soft product demand. The mining and construction equipment company lowered its full-year profit forecast.
Shares slipped in morning trading Friday.
For the three months that ended March 31, Caterpillar earned $271 million, or 46 cents per share. A year earlier the company earned $1.25 billion, or $2.03 per share.
Removing restructuring costs, earnings were 67 cents per share. This met the expectations of analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research.
Revenue fell to $9.46 billion from $12.7 billion.
Caterpillar Inc. said Friday that it foresees a full-year, adjusted profit of $3.70 per share, down from its prior outlook of $4 per share. Analysts polled by FactSet expect $3.62 per share.
The company now expects 2016 sales and revenue in a range of $40 billion to $42 billion. Its previous guidance was for sales and revenue between $40 billion and $44 billion.
Caterpillar said that it now expects restructuring costs of about $550 million for the year, up from the $400 million it had previously predicted. The Peoria-based company said the main reason for the increase in costs was because it decided to end production of on-highway vocational trucks.
At quarter's end, Caterpillar had 114,300 employees. That compares with 129,400 in the year-ago period. The company said in January that it planned to close five plants, causing a loss of about 670 jobs in Illinois and several other states. The move is part of a broader cost-cutting campaign announced last year that's expected to affect about 10,000 jobs over three years.
The company's stock slipped 34 cents to close Friday at $78.32.
Business on 04/23/2016