AK Steel Sees Q4 Earnings Beat

(RTTNews) - AK Steel Holding Corp. (AKS) said Wednesday that it expects fourth quarter earnings $0.02 to $0.06 per share, excluding the effects of a potential non-cash income tax benefit related to pension and other postretirement benefit gains.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters currently expect the company to report a loss of $0.03 per share for the fourth quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

AK Steel also said it expects fourth quarter shipments of about 1.4 million tons, up about 13% from the third quarter shipments of about $1.24 million tons.

The company expects its average selling price for the fourth quarter of 2013 to decrease about 4% from its average selling price of $1,071 per ton for the third quarter of 2013, mainly due to a lower proportion of value-added shipments to the spot market in the fourth quarter.

The company said that it expects to incur lower production costs in the fourth quarter, mainly as a result of lower costs for iron ore pellets. Additionally, the company expects total planned maintenance outage costs to be about $2 million in the fourth quarter, compared to $4.2 million incurred in the third quarter.

The company projects expense for the fourth quarter of about $5 million related to the Middletown Works unplanned blast furnace outage, net of insurance recoveries.