Peabody Warns On Q1 Earnings, Revenues; Stock Down In Pre-market

(RTTNews) - Shares of Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU) were losing more than 8 percent in pre-market activity on the NYSE after the coal producer said Thursday that it expects weak earnings and revenues in its first quarter. Revenues would be below market estimates.

For the first quarter, the company expects income from continuing operations of $45 million, adjusted EBITDA of $160 million and revenue of $980 million.

In the prior year, the company's income from continuing operations was $284.1 million, adjusted EBITDA was $390.6 million on revenues of $1.364 billion.

Analysts on average expect the company to report revenues of $1.04 billion, according to figures compiled by Thomson Reuters. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Sales volumes in the first quarter were largely in-line with expectations for seaborne segments while the U.S. thermal segments reported lower than expected shipments.

The seaborne thermal segment shipped 4.0 million tons, including 2.5 million export tons, the seaborne met segment shipped 1.4 million tons, the PRB segment shipped 18.7 million tons and the Other U.S. thermal segment shipped 3.2 million tons.

The company said the first-quarter results were impacted by various factors, such as unfavorable seaborne thermal coal mix, lower average realized prices in the seaborne metallurgical coal segment, higher than anticipated costs at the CMJV, lower U.S. thermal volumes as well as an approximate $18 million non-cash remeasurement of AUD denominated monetary assets.

Peabody President and Chief Executive Officer Jim Grech said, "Our first quarter included some unforeseen production challenges that are now behind us. The CMJV dragline and Wambo longwall are again operating on plan and Shoal Creek continues to exceed production expectations as we begin the second quarter."

The company plans to release first-quarter results on May 2.

In pre-market activity on the NYSE, Peabody shares were losing more than 8% to trade at $21.60.