Airbus parent EADS reported a 34 per cent drop in nine-month operating profit today as it grapples with costly production problems at its A380 superjumbo programme.
Earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) and before goodwill impairment and exceptional items were €1.393 billion ($1.78 billion), down from €2.099 billion a year ago.
The figure included €1 billion of charges relating to delays to the A380. Sales grew 17 per cent to €27.469 billion in the first nine months of the year, slightly beating the €27.005 billion forecast in the poll.
A spokesman for EADS said: "The underlying business increased profitability even despite a strong US dollar headwind."
EADS failed to issue a new operating earnings forecast for the full year after withdrawing it last month amid a crisis over the A380 that the company said would create a €4.8 billion profit shortfall in coming years.
"Based on the expectation of 430 Airbus aircraft deliveries in 2006 and strong contributions from its helicopters, defence and space businesses EADS is set to achieve revenues of well above 37 billion euros for the full year," EADS said in a statement.
The company received a major blow last night when FedEx said it cancelled its order for 10 A380-800F freighter aircraft because of delivery delays, opting instead to buy planes from rival US planemaker Boeing.
The biggest buyer of the world's biggest plane, Emirates, said last month it would send its own audit team to Airbus before entering talks to address the A380's two-year delay. Emirates has 43 of the $300 million superjumbos on order.