Cleveland-Cliffs Q4 Earnings: Revenue Miss, EPS Miss, $1.5B Buyback And More

Cleveland-Cliffs Inc CLF reported first-quarter financial results after the market close on Monday. Here’s a look at the key metrics from the quarter.

Q4 Earnings: Cleveland-Cliffs reported first-quarter revenue of $5.2 billion, which missed the consensus estimate of $5.346 billion, according to Benzinga Pro. The company reported adjusted earnings of 18 cents per share, which missed analyst estimates of 22 cents per share.

Steel shipments came in at 3.9 million net tons in the first quarter. The company said it had total liquidity of $4 billion as of March 31.

Cleveland-Cliffs noted it repurchased 30.4 million shares in the first quarter. The company’s board also authorized a new share repurchase program of up to $1.5 billion.

“Our first quarter results were highlighted by the resiliency of automotive production in the United States, which helped to offset a temporary buyers strike from service centers in January and February,” said Lourenco Goncalves, chairman, president and CEO of Cleveland-Cliffs.

“With more automotive and less service center business, the first quarter mix was richer than originally anticipated, driving both our average selling prices and production costs higher than expected.”

Outlook: Cleveland-Cliffs maintained all of its previous guidance for full-year 2024. The company still expects full-year steel shipments of 16.5 million net tons and year-over-year steel unit cost reductions of approximately $30 per net ton.

“Looking forward, we expect to benefit in Q2 from the lower costs under our guidance, which we have maintained. Our largest end market, the automotive sector, is expected to remain strong. Orders from our service center customers have started to increase, with spot pricing also on the upswing,” Goncalves said.

Management will hold a conference call to discuss these results Tuesday morning at 8:30 a.m. ET.

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CLF Price Action: Cleveland-Cliffs shares were down 2.69% after hours at $20.29 at the time of publication Monday, according to Benzinga Pro.

Photo: Janno Nivergall from Pixabay.