Boeing Co reported sharply lower third-quarter profit on Wednesday after a strike by its plane assembly workers wiped out almost a month of production at its Seattle-area plants.
The U.S.-based plane maker and defense contractor said it would not update its financial outlook until after the end of the strike by its largest union, now in its seventh week. The two sides are set to resume talks on Thursday.
Boeing, which outsold EADS unit Airbus last year, said quarterly net profit fell to $695 million, or 96 cents per share, from $1.1 billion, or $1.44 per share, a year earlier.
Excluding certain one-time items, the company reported profit of $1.02 per share. That beat Wall Street’s lowered average forecast of $1 per share, according to Reuters Estimates.
Boeing said the strike, along with some delays on getting galleys installed in some of its widebody planes, cost the company 60 cents per share in profit.
Revenue fell 7 percent to $15.3 billion, largely because of the strike.
The 27,000 members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers walked off the job on September 6 after rejecting Boeing’s three-year contract offer.
The two sides are set to resume talks with the help of a federal mediator on Thursday, but have so far struggled to find common ground on the key issue of outsourcing.
Boeing said it was well positioned to deal with a long strike and effects of the financial crisis, but warned that it may need to provide financing to some of its customers for planes delivered in 2009, a sign that it is concerned about the financial health of airlines.
Boeing’s shares have fallen about 41 percent over the past six months and hit a 4-1/2 year low of $39.99 last week, hurt by broad economic concerns, volatile oil prices and worries about the financial strength of airlines.
The Standard & Poor’s Aerospace and Defense index is down about 33 percent over the last six months.
