Boeing Co on Wednesday topped Wall Street expectations with a 78 percent jump in quarterly profit on strength in its defence operations, and raised its earnings forecast for 2004.
Boeing also raised its commercial plane delivery forecast for 2005 to 320, at the high end of its previous range, and held its estimate for 2004 deliveries steady at 285.
Shares of Boeing - the second-best performing stock so far this year among the 30 stocks in the Dow Jones industrial average - rose 0.6 percent in early trading.
The Chicago-based maker of commercial and military jets posted a profit of $456 million, or 56 cents per share, compared with $256 million, or 32 cents per share, a year earlier.
Per-share results, after including a 2-cent gain for the sale of Boeing Capital Corp's commercial finance unit, a 4-cent charge for retiring $1 billion of Boeing Capital debt, and a 14-cent contribution from state tax settlements and other adjustments, beat Wall Street's average forecast of 41 cents per share, according to Reuters Estimates.
Sales rose 8 percent to $13.15 billion, topping forecasts of $12.42 billion.
The company generated $2.3 billion in cash flow, before making a $1.6 billion contribution to pension plans.
"There's always a lot of moving parts at Boeing, but the cash tells you how they're operating," said Howard Rubel, an analyst with Schwab Soundview Capital Markets.
Revenue for Integrated Defense Systems, Boeing's defense unit, jumped 13 percent to $8.3 billion, helped by better results in its electronic networks and support system businesses. Operating margins rose to 9.9 percent from 7.7 percent.
The Commercial Airplanes unit posted revenue that fell 8 percent to $4.6 billion as deliveries rose but included more smaller planes. Still, operations were more profitable and the company said its closely watched all-new 7E7 model, due in 2008, was on track and was drawing "unprecedented customer interest".
Boeing will offer more details in its conference call at 10:30 am EDT (1430 GMT), and analysts will likely question if Boeing's earlier forecast of 200 firm orders for the 7E7 by year's end, still stands. Currently, the tally stands at 52 with only two months to go.
Looking ahead, the maker of high-technology weapons and military transport vehicles raised its 2004 earnings forecast to $2.40 to $2.60 per share from $2.25 to $2.45 per share, mostly due to lower tax expense. It held its 2004 revenue outlook at about $52 billion.
For the full year, analysts had expected a profit of $2.42 per share, on revenue of $51.74 billion.
The company also kept its 2005 earnings forecast at its previous target of $2.35 to $2.60 per share, and left its revenue outlook at a range of $57 billion to $59 billion.
For 2005, analysts were looking for earnings of $2.55 per share, on revenue of $57.71 billion.
Boeing shares were up 28 cents at $50.26 on the New York Stock Exchange. To date, the stock is up nearly 19 percent and has beaten the performance of all but one of its peers within the Dow - ExxonMobil Corp, which has risen 20.5 percent on the back of the rise in oil prices.
Boeing shares have doubled in value in the last year and a half, powered by defense sales that have offset airliner sales slowed by airline financial woes.