How General Electric Earnings Improved

Quarterly revenues in the oil and gas segment were down 16% year over year, from $4.6 billion to $3.87 billion. That drop was partially offset by a 1% increase in power and water segment revenues. Overall, industrial segment revenues were down 1% at $32.56 billion, compared with $33.01 billion in the year-ago quarter. Totals include $875 million in corporate items and eliminations for the third quarter of 2015 and $902 million for the year-ago quarter.

The company also reported sales on the basis of its industrial businesses and its “verticals”; that is, the businesses GE expects to retain as it shaves off parts of GE Capital. These are GECAS, EFS, Healthcare Equipment Finance, Working Capital Solutions and run-off Insurance. The reasoning is that this pro-forma figure gives shareholders a better idea of what the company will look like very soon. In the third quarter, the revenue from the industrials and verticals, excluding special items of $932 million, totaled $28.88 billion, up 2% compared with the third quarter of 2014, when the total was $28.27 billion.

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GE also noted that its backlog during the quarter rose 5% year over year to $270 billion. Of that total, $199 billion is services backlog and $70 billion is equipment.

CEO Jeff Immelt said:

Our GE Capital exit plan is ahead of plan and we expect GE Capital dividends to the parent of ~$3 billion for 2015. This week we announced the sale of $30 billion of commercial lending businesses, bringing our total signed deals to date to $126 billion. We also expect to launch the Synchrony share exchange next week, which will significantly reduce the amount of GE stock outstanding. Through the exchange and dividends, we are on track to return ~$30 billion to shareowners in 2015.

Analysts have estimated fourth-quarter EPS of $0.54 on revenues of $37.09 billion. For the 2015 fiscal year, the current consensus calls for EPS of $1.30 on revenues of $124.03 billion.

Shares traded down about 1.2% in Friday’s premarket session, at $27.70 in a 52-week range of $19.37 to $28.68. Thomson Reuters had a consensus analyst price target of $30.00 before the results were announced.

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