Textron Q4 Profit Rises; Sees FY14 Earnings Below Estimates - Update

(RTTNews) - Industrial conglomerate Textron, Inc. (TXT) Wednesday reported a higher fourth-quarter profit, as revenues increased and beat analysts' expectations. The company also forecast 2014 earnings, but below Wall Street estimates.

For the fourth quarter, Textron posted net income of $167 million or $0.59 per share, higher than $148 million or $0.51 per share in the previous year. Income from continuing operations improved to $0.60 per share from $0.50 per share last year.

On average, 14 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected the company to earn $0.59 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Textron, the maker of Cessna aircraft and Bell helicopters, said its quarterly revenues grew 4 percent to $3.51 billion from $3.36 billion in the prior-year quarter. Ten analysts had consensus revenue estimate of $3.43 billion for the quarter.

Cessna segment revenues increased $22 million, mainly due to delivery of 62 new Citation jets in the quarter, compared with 53 in the fourth quarter of 2012. Bell segment revenues increased $226 million, reflecting delivery of 13 V-22's, 6 H-1's and 75 commercial aircraft.

"Overall, we had a good fourth quarter to close out the year, with revenue growth at Cessna, Bell and Industrial and solid cash generation across all of our businesses," said Chairman and CEO Scott Donnelly.

Looking ahead to full-year 2014, the company expects earnings per share from continuing operations are to be in the range of $2.00 to $2.20.

Revenues are expected to be about $13.2 billion, up about 9 percent from 2013. Street currently is looking for 2014 earnings of $2.23 per share, on revenues of $13.11 billion.

The company stated that the projections do not include the impact of the planned acquisition of Beechcraft, which is expected to close during the first half of the year.

Last month end, Aircraft maker Beechcraft Corp. had announced that Textron has agreed to buy its parent company Beech Holdings LLC for about $1.4 billion in cash. The acquisition of Beech Holdings will enable Textron to further expand its offering of propeller-powered range of aircraft.

TXT closed Tuesday's regular trading at $36.10 on the NYSE.