Boeing Deliveries Top Expectations

Boeing Co. said it delivered 40 commercial airplanes to customers in the first quarter, more than some aerospace analysts expected.

Many analysts had thought the company would deliver fewer airplanes in the first three months of the year because Boeing is still recovering from a 10-week strike by 32,500 members of its Machinists Union late last year.

“They really ramped up production in March,” said Paul Nisbet, an analyst at JSA research in Newport, Rhode Island.

Nisbet said he raised his first-quarter earnings estimates for the world’s biggest planemaker to 47 cents a share from 35 cents as a result of the stronger-than-expected deliveries. Boeing earned 53 cents a share in the first quarter of 1995.

The planes delivered during the first quarter were 15 737s, three 747s, seven 757s, seven 767s, and eight 777s. Seattle-based Boeing delivered 59 planes in the same period a year ago.