After a major miss on earnings in the last quarter, Ford Motor (NYSE:F) admitted that they blew it with guidance, and it was a big blow, as it was way off the mark, suggesting too much optimism and not enough reality.
Ford generated earnings of 30 cents a share, while analyst had been expecting a whopping 48 cents a share. There was an obvious disconnect there.
CFO Lewis Booth said, "We recognize that we missed versus people's expectations, but we also will continue to try to do a better job of making people aware what the outlook is."
Booth added that while the company did give guidance on some increased costs, they did fail with Europe. He noted, "We gave pretty clear guidance we were going to have some cost increases in the fourth quarter. We're clearly disappointed that we guided that Europe was going to be profitable."
In other words, the miss was bad enough, but the guidance was atrocious when you consider an 18 cent gap between consensus and performance.
Ford didn't offer any guidance for 2011, but CEO Mulally and Booth said the company will improve pre-cash flow and profits during 2011.
Ford was trading at $16.14, down $2.65, or 14.10 percent, as of 12:05 PM EST.
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