Lynchburg, Va.,-based BWX Technologies on Wednesday reported a drop in both revenue and profit during the first quarter of 2019.
The Department of Energy contractor recorded revenue of $416 million, down 9% from $457 million in the first three months of 2018, according to a press release.
Meanwhile, net income dropped from $66.4 million, or $0.66 per diluted share, in first-quarter 2018 to $49 million, or $0.51 per share, in the same three-month period of 2019.
The Nuclear Operations Group, which manages nuclear naval business and uranium downblending contracts with the Energy Department’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), reported revenue of $305 million for the first three months of this year, down about 3.7% from nearly $317 million a year ago. That was due in part to timing of certain purchases and lower missile tube work volume, the earnings report says.
The group’s quarterly operating income was $57.6 million, a drop of 15% from $67.6 million in 2018.
“While first quarter results were lighter than the prior-year period, they were in line with our expectations,” said BWXT President and CEO Rex Geveden. “We anticipate a similar outcome in the second quarter preceding the Columbia-Class production ramp and Nuclear Services Group growth, which will result in nearly sixty percent of our earnings in the second half of the year.”
The company is keeping its 2019 earnings guidance of roughly $2.50 per share.
BWX Technologies is manufacturing reactors for the Navy’s next-generation of ballistic missile submarines, the Columbia-class fleet. The company is also manufacturing missile tubes for the Columbia boats, but has taken a beating on that contract after botching welds on a dozen of the tubes last year and chewing up nearly two-thirds of the schedule margin for the first Columbia boat: a vessel expected to go to sea in the early 2030s.
The company has bid on more tube work and has said its reactor contract should be definitized this summer. The company’s latest 10-Q statement, filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, had no news about either contract.
BWX Technologies remains a prominent player in the DOE’s environmental cleanup of former nuclear weapons sites but has faded somewhat in the last decade from the NNSA’s nuclear security enterprise. The company used to be part of the management and operations contractor for the Los Alamos National Laboratory, but lost that role in November, when Triad Nuclear Security took over the lab.
