Lucent Warns Of Larger Loss

Communications Today, Dec 14, 2001

Lucent Technologies [LU] said its fiscal first-quarter loss would be larger than Wall Street expects as sales keep falling due to the prolonged slump in capital spending by telecom carriers.

Lucent has reported net losses in each of its last four quarters, but believes its first quarter for fiscal year 2002 - ending Dec. 31 - will mark the low point of the market downturn for revenues. It also reiterated it expects a return to profitability and positive cash flow during the current fiscal year.

The company expects a first-quarter loss from continuing operations, which excludes a range of charges, of between 23 cents and 26 cents a share. It said this is in line with earlier projections of a loss smaller than the loss of 27 cents a share reported for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2001.

Wall Street analysts were looking for a loss of between 9 cents and 24 cents a share, with a mean forecast of a loss of 17 cents, according to research firm Thomson Financial/First Call.

Lucent said first-quarter revenue will fall to between $3.1 billion and $3.4 billion, from $4.8 billion in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2001. It blamed the expected decline on an industry-wide reduction in spending for telecom network infrastructure and related services.

Analysts had expected Lucent to post revenues in the quarter of $4.47 billion, according to Thomson Financal/First Call. Lucent is scheduled to report results for the first quarter in late January. >TK Credit Suisse First Boston [CSR]: AT&T [T]: Nortel Networks [NT]: Lucent Technologies [LU]: