Boeing Lands Order, Reports Loss

Boeing Co. received an order for 54 737-jetliners from International Lease Finance Corp. worth approximately $2.25 billion, the aircraft maker said Tuesday.

Boeing announced the order shortly after it released its second-quarter earnings, which fell in comparison to last year, mostly due to a one-time charge for a special retirement program.

Boeing lost $231 million, or 68 cents a share, for the quarter ended June 30, compared with profits of $222 million, or 65 cents a share, a year ago.

Sales for the quarter were $5.56 billion, up from $5.4 billion last year.

The 1995 results included a one-time, $600 million pre-tax charge to pay for roughly 9,500 early retirement packages offered to employees earlier this year.

Without the one-time charge, Boeing would have earned $254 million, or 74 cents per share, for the quarter.

In the announcement Monday, Boeing said ILFC, a major aircraft leasing company based in Beverly Hills, Calif., had ordered a mix of new-generation 737-600s, -700s, and -800s, with ILFC to choose specific numbers of the models later. Deliveries will begin in November 1997 and continue through late 2004.

In other earnings reports Tuesday:

Washington Water Power Co. said its earnings declined slightly in the second quarter, depressed in part by a decrease in revenues from the sale of excess hydroelectric energy.

Earnings for the 12-month period were higher.

For the three-month period ended June 30, the Spokane-based utility reported income of $12.9 million, or 23 cents per share, after allowing for payment of preferred-stock dividends. Revenues were $159 million.

Comparable figures from the 1994 quarter were $13.5 million, or 25 cents per common share, on revenues of $147.2 million.

For the 12-month period, income was $69.4 million, or $1.28 per share, on revenues of $689.6 million. Income in the 1993-1994 period was $65 million, or $1.23 per share, on revenues of $638.8 million.

Chairman Paul Redmond said financial results were helped by continued growth in the number of electrical and natural gas customers, but hurt by higher interest costs and decreased revenues from the wholesale electricity market.

Although contracts due to take effect later this year and in 1996 will boost those sales, high streamflows this spring have softened prices, he said.

Redmond also noted WWP’s non-utility operations contributed 28 cents to earnings for the 12-month period compared with 19 cents the year before, although the return for both the 1994 and 1995 quarters was four cents.

Sterling Financial Corp. announced higher net income for the fiscal year ended June 30, but a drop-off in fourth-quarter results.

The Spokane-based thrift earned $9.3 million for the year, compared with $8.5 million for the previous year.

Per share comparisons - $1.27 vs. $1.60 - suffered due to a preferred stock issue during the fourth quarter of the 1994 fiscal year.

For the quarter, income was $1.3 million, or 24 cents per share, down from $2.1 million, or 38 cents per share, a year ago.

Chairman Harold Gilkey said the shrinking difference between the institutional cost of borrowing and lending money made the year and quarter challenging.

But an increase in assets to $1.54 billion from $1.37 billion, and increased business and consumer lending, compensated in part for the loss of margin and reduced residential lending, he said.

Sterling also announced a 10 percent stock dividend to be issued Aug. 31 to holders of record Aug. 7. Per-share results were restated to reflect the dividend.

, DataTimes