Avista lowers earnings outlook
Avista Corp. has lowered its earnings outlook for 2007 after reporting Wednesday that its second quarter profits were $14.2 million. The company now expects earnings per share between 85 cents and $1 for all of 2007, down from its earlier forecast of $1.40 to $1.55 per share.
The profit rose from the April-through-June period a year ago, when the Spokane utility posted net income of $13.5 million.
Despite the better results, Avista Chairman and CEO Gary Ely said the company expects to post lower profits for all of 2007 than originally forecast. He said losses at the company’s recently sold subsidiary, Avista Energy, along with weather and reduced hydropower generation at dams have dampened expectations.
For the first six months of 2007, Avista had profits of $28.3 million, compared with profits of $45 million in the first six months of 2006.
Avista’s sales for the second quarter were $304 million. For the first six months, sales were $763.2 million. During 2006, comparable numbers were revenues of $287.4 million for the second quarter and $786.6 for the first six months.
•Starbucks Corp. said Wednesday its fiscal third-quarter profit climbed 9 percent as the world’s largest specialty coffee retailer opened 668 new stores and announced plans to continue expanding at an equally blistering pace next year.
Earnings for the three months ended July 1 rose to $158.3 million, or 21 cents per share, from $145.5 million, or 18 cents per share, during the same period last year.
The company said it expects revenue to grow about 18 percent next year, slower than this year’s predicted 20 percent growth, and for same-store sales to grow at the same rate as in 2007.
•Microsoft Corp. will delay the release of Office 2008 for Apple Inc.’s Macintosh computers until the middle of January 2008, in order to fix lingering bugs in the software.
The software maker previously said the new suite, which is to include Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint and the Entourage e-mail program, would go on sale sometime in the second half of 2007.
“It really is just a quality issue across the board,” Craig Eisler, general manager of Microsoft’s Macintosh business unit, said in an interview Wednesday.
Eisler said Apple’s decision to switch to Intel-based chips disrupted the software development process.