Boeing’s profit climbs on tax gains

Boeing's profit climbed as the plane maker benefited from one-time tax gains and lower expenses for the 787 Dreamliner, its costliest-ever jetliner.

'The Boeing story continues to be all about execution and cash generation and this quarter didn't disappoint despite a small hiccup in the company's Space division,” Jason Gursky, an analyst at Citigroup, wrote in a note to clients Wednesday.

Investors have been nervous that the global aerospace market is cooling and wary of Boeing after recent earnings disappointments. The company in July reported its first quarterly loss in seven years and its first-quarter results missed analysts' estimates for the first time in five years.

Third-quarter earnings rose to $3.51 a share after adjusting for some pension expenses, Chicago-based Boeing said in a statement Wednesday. That topped the $2.67 average of analysts' estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

The results were boosted by 98 cents a share in tax-related gains. The plane maker signaled in July that it would receive a tax benefit of 28 cents a share stemming from an audit of its federal income taxes for 2011 and 2012.

Earnings were bolstered by another 70 cents a share in tax-related gains that analysts hadn't included in their forecasts.

Deferred production costs for the 787 Dreamliner fell by $150 million from the previous quarter to $27.5 billion. Rockwell Collins in Cedar Rapids provides avionics and communications equipment for the 787 Dreamliner.

Third-quarter revenue fell 7.5 percent to $23.9 billion as Boeing delivered 188 commercial jets, 11 fewer than a year earlier. Sales were also hurt as shipments fell for F-15 fighter jets and production ended on the C-17 military transport.

Boeing's commercial airplane business posted an operating profit of $1.6 billion, down 10 percent from a year earlier. The company's defense business earned $784 million from operations in the third quarter, a decline of 23 percent.