Thursday, The Toro Co. (TTC), a turf maintenance equipment company, reported a decline in the third quarter earnings, however beat analysts' estimates. The company said weakness in domestic economy dampened demand throughout the quarter.
Net earnings for the quarter stood at $38.2 million or $0.99 per share, down from $42.5 million or $1.02 per share in the same quarter last year.
Analysts polled by First Call/Thomson Financial expected the company to report earnings of $0.95 per share for the quarter.
Quarterly net sales rose to $492.6 million from $478.7 million in the prior-year quarter. Analysts expected revenue of $473.12 million for the quarter.
Segment-wise, Professional segment sales increased 5.9% while Residential segment sales declined 0.6% for the quarter.
Michael J. Hoffman, Toro's chairman and chief executive officer, said, "As expected, weakness in the domestic economy dampened demand through our fiscal third quarter, however, our strong international business enabled us to deliver modest sales growth."
During the quarter, 1.4 million common shares were repurchased and currently company has authorization to repurchase up to 3 million additional shares.
For the nine-months ended, net earnings were $119.6 million or $3.06 per share compared with $135.9 million or $3.23 per share. Net sales for the period stood at $1.536 billion, down from $1.544 billion prior year.
Looking forward, the company said now it expects fiscal year earnings per share to be down 6% - 9% from the $3.40 per share reported for fiscal 2007. The company still sees fiscal year net sales to be roughly equal to fiscal 2007 net sales of $1.87 billion.
Analysts expect earnings in the range of $3.19 per share for the fiscal year.
TTC stock is currently trading up 1.14% at $36.73 on the NYSE.
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