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Third-Quarter Results Off 7% From Last Year's Level

23 October 1998

Third-Quarter Results Off 7% From Last Year's Level

    NEW YORK--Oct. 22, 1998--Wall Street's anxiety over third-quarter results was well founded. A Business Week's flash estimate, based announced profits of 130 companies, is a sign of a slowing economy: Profits are down 7% from a year ago, on an anemic 2% sales increase. Worse, the weakness that emerged in the second quarter has now spread beyond manufacturing to service companies -- whose earnings had risen 20% in the second quarter, only to drop 23% in the third. Much of the pain was concentrated in financial services. But take out General Motors Corp.'s $809 million strike-induced loss, and earnings would have declined only 3%.