Imperial Sugar Company Falls 10.74% (IPSU)

Shares of Imperial Sugar Company IPSU ended the Friday trading session down 10.74% at $12.13 per share. The day's trading range for shares of Imperial Sugar Company was between $11.35 and $13.21 per share. Analysts covering the company's stock give it a consensus price target of $13.13 per share. Volume of 567,000 shares was nearly triple the daily average volume of 210,000 shares. Imperial Sugar Company (IPSU) announced before the Friday trading session that it beat consensus Wall Street estimates. The company announced a fiscal 3rd quarter loss per share of 48 cents, on revenue of $261 million. According to a survey of analysts by Thomson Reuters, the average Wall Street estimate called for a loss of 86 cents per share, on revenue of $214.73 million. Although it easily beat Wall Street estimates, the company has not fully recovered from a 2008 refinery explosion and it is still unable to operate at peak production levels. “Production at the Port Wentworth refinery and resulting sales volumes continued to increase during the quarter but more work is needed to achieve capacity operations,” said president and CEO John Sheptor. “Equipment and process improvements led to better production volumes in the quarter, but the average production rate remains below our potential. To meet customer requirements, refining days were added, which increased the cost of production and reduced margin. As production rate is further increased, variable costs such as labor, maintenance and energy are expected to improve.” Read more from Benzinga's Company news.