General Electric Co. announced that its earnings for the second quarter has increased by 0.9%, as the huge conglomerate reported it had lower costs, but its adjusted earnings dropped as revenue fell below Wall Street estimates.
Nevertheless, earnings were ahead by 1 cent of estimates from Wall Street analysts who had been polled earlier.
Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO has attempted to lower GE’s reliance on the conglomerate’s financial arm over the last few years, while increasing the industrial businesses in the company, which are valued more highly by investors.
Immelt also announced that he expects margin growth to continue and segment profits to increase during the second six months of this year.
Profit was reported at GE to be $3.13 billion or equal to 30 cents per share compared to last year’s second quarter profit of $3.11 billion and 29 cents per share.
Operating earnings, which do not included pension costs, was down 2 cents from 38 cents to 36 cents per share.
Revenue also fell to $35.11 billion, a 3.5% drop.
Analysts expected revenue to come in at $35.56 billion with earnings of 35 cents per share.
Total expenses and costs dropped by 2.5% to end the quarter at $31.39 billion.
Industrial business revenue at GE was down by 0.8% to just $25.17 billion, but saw a rise in profit of 2.4%.
Revenue from its GE Capital dropped by 3.3% to end the quarter at $10.98 billion and its profit plunged 9.4%.
