Carnival shares fall as fuel costs cut into outlook

Carnival Corp. on Thursday reported jump in fiscal third-quarter revenue and profit, but warned that higher fuel costs will likely weigh down profit throughout the year.

Carnival's shares fell $4.41, or 6.6 percent, to $62.58 in morning trading.

The Miami-based company's profit rose 28 percent to $1.71 billion, or $2.41 per share. Earnings, adjusted for asset impairment gains and non-recurring gains, came to $2.36 per share.

Revenue jumped 5.8 percent to $5.84 billion.

Both profit and revenue topped Wall Street expectations of $2.31 per share and $5.82 billion, respectively.

But, the cruise line operator said higher fuel costs cut into the current quarter's bottom line and it expects those costs to continue impacting profit.

For the current quarter ending in November, Carnival expects its per-share earnings to range from 65 cents to 69 cents, below Wall Street estimates for 73 cents per share.

The company expects full-year earnings in the range of $4.21 to $4.25 per share.

Carnival shares have risen roughly 1 percent since the beginning of the year, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index has risen almost 9 percent. The stock has climbed 2.5 percent in the last 12 months.

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Elements of this story were generated by Automated Insights using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on CCL at https://www.zacks.com/ap/CCL