Earnings at BWX Technologies [BWXT], Lynchburg, Va., dipped slightly to just under $60 million even as second-quarter revenue rose 7% to about $470 million on the strength of busier work on naval nuclear submarine reactors, the company said after markets closed Monday.
That translated to earnings of 62 cents a share, down from about 60 cents a share a year ago, BWX Technologies wrote in a press release. The company had not released its latest 10-Q filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission at deadline Tuesday for Defense Daily, and was scheduled to host its quarterly earnings call Tuesday morning.
The nuclear heavy-equipment maker and uranium fuel processor’s Nuclear Operations Group led the charge, ringing in with an operating profit of just over $75 million — up 12% year-over-year — as segment sales rose nearly 8% to around $358 million. The Nuclear Operations Group handles the company’s Columbia and Virginia-class work, which benefited in the quarter from “an increase in production volume and the acceleration of long-lead material purchases.”
Also improving quarterly numbers in the Nuclear Operations Group, BWX Technologies is no longer booking charges related to 12 bad welds on the common missile tubes designed for Columbia– and Virginia-class submarines, the company wrote Monday.
In February, BWX Technologies announced the Navy would award the company some $2 billion in contracts for naval nuclear reactor components and fuel. The company recognized a nearly $30 million impairment last year because of the mistakes on the tubes.