DuPont the largest US chemical company,posted a second-quarter loss today and warned that business will not improve in the third-quarter as the economic downturn is hurting demand for chemicals and plastics.
DuPont posted a loss of $213 million, compared to earnings of $688 million in the period a year ago. Before one-time items, income fell to $432 million, or 41 cents a share, from $949 million, or 90 cents a share a year ago, which was in the range of lowered estimates on Wall Street.
Along with other chemical companies, DuPont has been hit by the US economic slowdown, which it has said is spreading to Europe, South America and parts of Asia.
DuPont shares rose 18.5 per cent in the second quarter, outperforming the 12.1 per cent rise in the S&P chemical index, on hopes that the chemical business was nearing a bottom and would soon rebound.
But DuPont said today that business will continue to deteriorate in the third-quarter. It said the third-quarter "will be substantially more challenging than the second quarter," adding that it expects to post a sequential decline in earnings.
To combat the downturn, DuPont announced a restructuring earlier this year, in which it will cut 5,500 jobs and another 1,300 contract workers.