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Ball to make changes as fourth-quarter profit falls 31%

Rocky Staff And Wire Reports

Published January 25, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.

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Ball Corp.'s chief executive pledged Thursday to make additional changes in the U.S. products packaging division after the company's fourth-quarter earnings fell 31 percent on costs because of business restructuring.

Chief Executive Officer David Hoover also said the company will build a can-production plant in Poland to meet demand in central and eastern Europe.

The Broomfield-based company has been consolidating U.S. operations and plans to close two aerosol container manufacturing plants and get out of the decorative tinplate can business.

"We believe we have hit bottom in this business," Hoover told analysts during a conference call. "We are assertively pursuing price in this marketplace and are implementing numerous cost-reduction initiatives."

Ball's fourth-quarter net income fell to $33.3 million, or 33 cents a share, from $48.3 million, or 46 cents, a year earlier. Results reflected costs of about $27 million, or 27 cents per share, related to the consolidation.

Excluding those costs and taxes, the company earned 60 cents a share, which met analyst forecasts.

* Revenue totaled $1.76 billion vs. $1.59 billion a year earlier.

FORD MOTOR Co. narrowed its losses in the fourth quarter amid continued weakness in North America and said the outlook for U.S. sales in 2008 remains grim.

* Net loss: $2.8 billion, or $1.30 a share, vs. a loss of $5.6 billion, or $2.98, a year earlier. Excluding special items, Ford lost 20 cents a share. Analysts predicted a loss of 19 cents.

* Revenue: $44.1 billion, up from $40.3 billion a year ago.

MICROSOFT CORP. said fiscal second-quarter profit topped analysts' expectations and climbed 79 percent, buoyed by rising sales of Windows-based personal computers.

* Net income: $4.71 billion, or 50 cents a share, up from $2.63 billion, or 26 cents a share, a year earlier. Analysts expected 46 cents.

* Revenue: $16.37 billion, up 31 percent from $12.5 billion a year ago. Analysts expected $15.95 billion.

AT&T INC. said earnings increased in the fourth quarter as its wireless and broadband businesses did well.

* Net income: $3.1 billion, or 51 cents a share, vs. $1.9 billion, or 50 cents a share, a year earlier. The results that quarter did not include the earnings of BellSouth.

* Revenue: $30.35 billion, up from $15.9 billion, mostly because of the takeover of BellSouth.