Posted by
alfredlester on Thursday, July 23, 2009 7:18:47 PM
American Express, the credit card lender, said Thursday that its earnings fell 48 percent in the second quarter, but it reversed the recent trend of quarterly losses to post a profit.
The company earned $337 million, or 9 cents a share, compared with $653 million, or 56 cents a share, a year earlier.
The results included an 18 cents a share cost of buying back preferred shares from the Treasury Department. Excluding that cost, earnings were 27 cents a share.
Revenue fell 18 percent to $6.09 billion from $7.46 billion a year ago.
Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters expected 26 cents a share on revenue of $6.29 billion. Analysts typically exclude one-time costs in their estimates.
Non-interest revenue fell 18 percent to $5.35 billion and interest income was down 31 percent to $1 default payday loan.29 billion.
In after-hours trading, shares fell as low as $28.26, after rising 2.4 percent, or 69 cents, to close at $29.45 in the regular session.
The company set aside $1.6 billion for loan losses compared with $1.8 billion a year ago, reflecting lower average loans, but that was offset by higher write-offs.
Loan write-offs increased to 10.3 percent, up from 5.8 percent a year ago.
Expenses fell 16 percent to $4.1 billion.
The chief executive, Kenneth I. Chenault, said the decline in cardholder spending had moderated somewhat in June, but that it was too early to say whether that indicated a recovery was under way.
Earnings Fall 48% at American Express
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