Genesee & Wyoming Q4 Profit Soars, But Results Miss View; Jan. Traffic Up 0.4%

(RTTNews) - Genesee & Wyoming Inc. or G&W (GWR) posted sharply higher fourth-quarter net income available to common stockholders of $58.28 million, or $1.03 per share, versus last year's $9.02 million, or $0.18 per share. Excluding the net impact of significant items, G&W's adjusted earnings per share were $1.07 in the fourth quarter of 2013. On average, 16 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected earnings per share of $1.16 for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude one-time items.

In the fourth quarter of 2013, total operating revenues grew 72.3% year-on-year to $391.7 million, from $227.3 million; thereby missing consensus estimates of $398.12 million. The company said the growth included $152.9 million in revenues from new operations, partially offset by a $9.4 million decrease from the net depreciation of foreign currencies relative to the U.S. dollar. Excluding the net impact from foreign currency depreciation, G&W's same railroad operating revenues, excluding former RailAmerica railroads, improved $20.9 million, or 9.2%.

Separately, G&W reported traffic for January 2014 of 156,584 carloads, an increase of 0.4% from last year's 156,027 carloads. In the 2013 fourth quarter, G&W's traffic was 471,906 carloads. On a combined company basis, traffic rose 32,988 carloads, or 7.5%, compared with traffic in the fourth quarter of 2012.

The growth in traffic was chiefly due to increases of 9,358 carloads of coal and coke traffic (primarily in the Central, Midwest and Ohio regions), 6,566 carloads of metallic ores traffic (primarily in the Australian Region), 4,515 carloads of agricultural products traffic (primarily in the Australian Region), 4,479 carloads of metals traffic (primarily in the Northeast and Mountain West regions) and 3,898 carloads of petroleum products traffic (primarily in the Pacific Region), according to the company.