Caterpillar (CAT) reported second quarter earnings this morning of $2.83 a share, well below the $3.11 a share expected by Wall Street analysts.
And then, to make the future as grim as the present, Caterpillar rearmed its earnings guidance for the fiscal 2019 year of $11.75 to $12.75 a share but said that results would be at the lower end of that range. The Wall Street consensus earnings projection calls for $12.20 a share for the year.
As of 1:30 p.m. New York time, shares of Caterpillar were down 4.47%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was lower by 0.43%.
Reading below the headline numbers supports the gloom. Higher tariffs as a result of the U.S.-China trade war led to higher manufacturing costs in the quarter. Sales in the energy and transportation segment, the company’s second largest unit, fell 4% year over year as North American sales fell by 11% on lower demand for equipment in the Permian Basin oil shale region. The company’s order backlog at the end of the quarter was down $1.9 billion from the end of the first quarter to $15 billion.
The larger conclusion, the one pushing down the manufacturing and exporting heavy Dow Jones Industrial Average today is that Caterpillar’s results are more evidence that the manufacturing sector is slowing. The themes in Caterpillar’s report are similar to those in other industrial company’s results this quarter: rising costs, Â moderating demand, and weaker confidence in a rebound in the second half.
As timing would have it, this morning also brought new results from the IHS Markit survey of manufacturing in the EuroZone. That survey showed the steepest contraction in six years. Also today the Purchasing Manager’s Index for Germany dropped to the lowest level in seven years.
