TORONTO (Reuters) -
Bombardier Inc (), the world's
top passenger train maker and No. 3 civil aircraft
manufacturer, said on Wednesday that quarterly profit nearly
tripled as aircraft deliveries rose, prompting it to reinstate
its quarterly dividend.
Bombardier said it earned $226 million, or 12 cents a
share, in the first quarter ended on April 30, up from $79
million, or 4 cents a share, a year earlier.
Earnings before financing income, financing expense and
income taxes were $321 million, compared with $183 million last
year.
Analysts, on average, had expected earnings per share
before exceptional items of 9 cents a share, according to
Reuters data.
Revenue for the quarter was $4.79 billion, up 21 percent
from $3.97 billion for the same time last year helped by an
increase in orders in its two key divisions, transportation and
aerospace.
Aircraft deliveries were 87 planes during the quarter, up
from 78 for the same period last year.
The Montreal-based company also said it planned to
reinstate its quarterly dividend of 2.5 cents a share. It last
paid a dividend in 2005.
Bombardier did not give an update on the progress in its
search for launch customers for its proposed CSeries airliner.
Bombardier has been looking for firm orders before formally
deciding to go ahead with the $3.2 billion plan to develop a
new 110-seat to 130-seat airliner.
The proposed CSeries jet would enter service by 2013 in a
market sector that is dominated by Boeing Co (BA.N) and Airbus
EADS ().
The Montreal-based company said last week it plans to
invest $250 million in a new aerospace manufacturing plant in
the central state of Queretaro in Mexico.
($1=$1.00 Canadian)
(Reporting by Scott Anderson; Editing by Frank McGurty)
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Consumer spending on apparel and
footwear slid during May as buyers scaled back on discretionary
purchases amid a sluggish U.S. economic environment, according
to a SpendingPulse report released on Wednesday.
May sales were down 1.1 percent versus May 2007, with
women's apparel declining 5.4 percent and footwear decreasing
1.0 percent. Men's apparel posted a gain of 4.8 percent.
Those declines could continue as consumers are hammered by
higher gasoline and food prices, a falling housing market and
the U.S. credit crisis.
"I think you probably need to see consumer confidence
numbers start to come up," Michael McNamara, vice president of
SpendingPulse, said in an interview. "You have to see a general
lift, I think, in the overall economy before some of these
apparel numbers will start to have a more consistent rebound."
SpendingPulse is the retail data service of MasterCard
Advisors, an arm of MasterCard Worldwide (MA.N).
Women's apparel sales have been weak for several months,
hurt by a combination of the weak economy and a lack of
fashions that have motivated purchases.
Apparel prices increased in May about 2 percent compared
with last year, and transactions were down 3 percent for the
period, according to SpendingPulse.
McNamara said that it is difficult to gauge whether
consumers will put their tax rebate checks to use on
discretionary purchases instead of bills or gasoline.
"I would expect to see that impact would probably be more
in June than in May since the checks just started to arrive,"
he said. "A lot of that depends on consumer confidence,
especially confidence in their employment. If the employment
numbers look shaky and people start to get worried about their
jobs, they're more liable to save that extra money or pay down
debt."
The SpendingPulse data is taken from the aggregate sales in
the U.S. MasterCard payment network, coupled with estimates on
all other payments including cash and check.
(Reporting by Erin Zureick; editing by Carol Bishopric)
DETROIT (Reuters) -
U.S. auto sales tumbled in May as
consumers spurned pickup trucks and SUVs in the face of record gasoline prices, driving General Motors Corp, Ford Motor Co and Chrysler LLC to double-digit declines.
Japan's Honda Motor Co Ltd outsold Chrysler for the first
time to emerge as the new No. 4 U.S. automaker, while Toyota
Motor Corp closed the gap with GM as the leading player in the
U.S. market, despite reporting lower sales than a year before.
Honda's Civic and Accord and Toyota's Camry and Corolla
sedans outsold Ford's F-Series pickup truck. It was the first
time a sedan outsold the perennial Ford bestseller since 1991.
"It is a watershed month. It's a sign of the times," said
Jim Farley, Ford's head of marketing, who joined the U.S.
automaker last year after 17 years at Toyota.
Honda and Nissan were the two major automakers to buck the
declining trend, posting sales increases of 11 percent and 4
percent, respectively. The figures boosted shares in Japanese
automakers in Tokyo, with Honda shooting up 6.9 percent.
"The dramatic increase in car sales appears to be one of
the most profound shifts in automotive buying patterns in more
than a decade," said Dick Colliver, executive vice president of
American Honda.
GM sales plunged 30 percent, Ford sales fell 19 percent and
Toyota's fell 8 percent. Sales were adjusted for an additional
sales day compared with the year earlier.
GM also announced plans to close four pickup and SUV plants
in North America and expand output at two car plants to align
its production to a market increasingly dominated by concern
about fuel efficiency.
Overall, U.S. sales fell to 14.25 million on an annualized
basis in May, down from 14.4 million in April and 15.2 million
on average in the first quarter.
GM's U.S. market share slid to 19 percent in May, a record
low for the embattled automaker that commanded 45 percent in
1980.
Car sales, which had accounted for less than half of
industry volume in 2007, surged to 57 percent in May. On the
losing end, truck sales hit their lowest rate since 1995.
JAPANESE SHARES UP
In Tokyo, Toyota shares climbed 2.6 percent and Nissan
Motor Co Ltd gained 4.3 percent, outperforming a 1.2 percent
gain for the market's benchmark Nikkei average
Shinya Naruse, analyst at Nomura Securities, said a shift
toward smaller cars from large vehicles has become even more
obvious, but concerns remained about the U.S. market.
"Japanese automakers grew as they are relatively strong in
smaller cars. It's almost unthinkable SUVs and pickup trucks
will regain popularity as oil prices are unlikely to drop
drastically."
"Still, the data is not something we can be happy about.
The U.S. auto market is deteriorating and profitability is
falling as the cars that sell are small ones."
Toyota said it no longer expected 2008 sales to match last
year's record results, owing to the decline in truck demand and
the slump in the U.S. economy.
"All of our previous assumptions on the full-size pickup
truck segment are off the table," Toyota division sales chief
Bob Carter said on a conference call.
The weak sales results add to concerns the U.S. auto market
is headed for its worst year in a decade amid high oil prices,
weak consumer confidence and tighter credit.
"I think the shift was more dramatic than we thought," said
Jesse Toprak, an analyst with industry tracking firm Edmunds,
who had forecast a widespread consumer defection from trucks.
Toprak said sales results showed U.S. automakers could
succeed with small car offerings even if they still struggle to
make them at a profit.
The shift toward more fuel-efficient cars and crossovers
has hit Detroit-based automakers and their truck-heavy lineups,
particularly hard. Sales for GM's Hummer SUV line dropped 60
percent in May as the automaker said it would sell or revamp a
brand that has become synonymous with gas-guzzling excess.
GM also lowered its second-quarter production forecast, but
set a third quarter production target just over 1 million
vehicles that was 3 percent higher than year-ago levels.
JP Morgan analyst Himanshu Patel said the higher production
suggested GM was looking to rebuild inventories. A three-month
strike at its supplier American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings
Inc had cut deeply into GM production through May.
Declining U.S. sales prompted Ford to announce an incentive
plan on its F-Series pickup trucks allowing customers to pay
the same price as the automaker's employees in June. The
company is looking to run down pickup truck inventories ahead
of a new model launch this fall.
Toprak said incentives were likely to to rise throughout
the summer months to help boost vehicle sales.
(Additional reporting by Aiko Hayashi in Tokyo; Editing by
Gerald E. McCormick and Andre Grenon)