Halliburton Beats Adjusted Profit Expectations, But Revenue Misses

Halliburton Co. reported a third-quarter loss of $54 million, or 6 cents a share, compared with a profit of $1.2 billion, or $1.41 a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding non-recurring items, such as asset write offs and severance costs related to the downturn in the energy market, adjusted earnings per share came in at 31 cents, beating the FactSet consensus of 27 cents. Revenue fell to $5.58 billion from $8.7 billion, led by a decline in North America as a result of reduced activity and pricing pressure. "This is a challenging market, but our strategy remains the same," said President Jeff Miller. "We are looking through this cycle to ensure that we are positioned to accelerate our growth when the industry recovers, and we are managing through the downturn by drawing upon our management's deep experience in navigating through past cycles." The stock, which was indicated slightly lower in light premarket trade, has lost 3.9% year to date while the S&P 500 has shed 1.3%.