Wednesday, August 27, 2008

S&P 500 Earnings Down 29% Year Over Year In Second Quarter

Standard & Poor's reported seconded quarter operating earnings were down 29% for the S&P 500 Index companies with 96% of the companies reporting. This was the fourth consecutive quarter that earnings declined for the index. S&P noted that earnings, ex-financials, were up 3.2%. Earnings contribution has rotated from financials to energy:
"The shift in earnings continues with Energy contributing 25.1% of the S&P 500’s operating earnings during the second quarter, up from 16.4% a year ago," says Howard Silverblatt, Senior Index Analyst at Standard & Poor’s. "Conversely, Financials have now posted their third consecutive quarter of negative earnings after accounting for 28.4% of operating earnings this time last year."


Source:
S&P 500 Q2 Earnings Down 29%; Financials Post
Third Consecutive Quarter of Negative Earnings (PDF)

Standard & Poor's
By: David R. Guarino and Howard Silverblatt
August 25, 2008
http://www2.standardandpoors.com/spf/pdf/index/082508_500eps_Q208-pr.pdf


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