Louisiana-Pacific Corp. LPX, -0.42% widened its second-quarter loss as the construction materials company recorded a debt-extinguishment charge, masking a double-digit increase in revenue.
Shares were down 8.3% to $10.10 in recent premarket trading as per-share earnings were below Wall Street expectations. The stock is up 42% in the past 12 months.
Louisiana-Pacific last posted a profit two years ago as the U.S. housing market remains weak, but exports have contributed to revenue growth in recent quarters.
In the latest quarter, the company's siding business--the second-largest contributor to the top line after oriented strand-board--saw sales improve 16% and operating earnings surge 73%. The strand-board segment swung to an operating profit of $17 million on a sales jump of 38%, versus a loss of $23 million a year ago.
Louisiana-Pacific reported a loss of $37.3 million versus a year-earlier loss of loss of $35.5 million. The latest results included an early debt extinguishment charge of $52.2 million. The per-share loss stayed flat at 27 cents a share as the number of shares outstanding increased 4.3%. The adjusted profit from continuing operations was two cents a share versus 25 cents a year ago.
Revenue rose 18% to $427.8 million. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters most recently projected five cents in per-share earnings on revenue of $419 million.
Gross margin widened sharply to 15.9% from 7.2%.
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