Caterpillar Sees First-Quarter Sales, Profit Below Estimates
- Company said it's `comfortable' with full-year earnings target
- China's slowdown has hit Caterpillar's mining customers
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Caterpillar Inc. gave its first quarterly earnings forecast in 90 years in a sign analysts are grappling with how much crude’s collapse is squeezing the machinery supplier.
Caterpillar made its forecast explicit on Thursday after what the Peoria, Illinois-based company called weeks of unheeded suggestions that analysts’ estimates were too high. Profit will fall to 65 cents to 70 cents per share, according to a regulatory filing, short of the 95-cent average of analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg. Sales will fall to $9.3 billion to $9.4 billion, compared with the $10.2 billion projected by analysts.