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Print[Ferro-alloys.com]BHP Billiton has beaten its guidance foriron ore production but fallen short in its petroleum business, according to full-year results released this morning.
Iron ore remains BHP's biggest money spinner and today's numbers show that Jimmy Wilson's first year in charge of the division was a strong one.
BHP had previously forecast full-year iron ore production of 183 million tonnes, including third-party tonnes, but actually delivered 187 million tonnes.
That number is expected to jump to 207 million tonnes this time next year.
BHP shares are 1.8 per cent higher after reporting the results. In early trade, the company's stock was 60 cents higher to $34.03.
BHP said expansion of its Jimblebar iron ore mine in the Pilbara was ahead of schedule, but the cost had blown out by $US340 million.
But BHP – which reports all its financials in US currency – stressed that the project remained on budget in Australian dollar terms
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The September quarter is traditionally a poor one for iron ore exporters, but the benchmark iron ore price has been unusually resilient in recent weeks and was worth a very healthy $US129 per tonne this morning.
The news was not quite as good in, where drilling delays on its Gulf of Mexico assets saw full-year guidance narrowly missed.
BHP had previously forecast full-year production from its petroleum division of 240 million barrels of oil equivalent, but today reported 235.76 million barrels of oil equivalent.
The company's flagship copper asset - a share in Chile's massive Escondida mine - overachieved during the past year, producing 28 per cent more copper than the previous year
BHP shares closed higher on Tuesday at $33.43, and were given a boost when Rio Tinto presented a strong set of quarterly results late on Tuesday afternoon.
BHP will report its full year financial result on August 20.
Its Australian annual meeting of shareholders will be held in Perth this year in late November.
The Perth office is home to more BHP employees than any other BHP office in the world.
Deutsche Bank analyst Paul Young described the result as ''very strong'', and named the copper result at Escondida and the iron ore result in the Pilbara as the highlights.
''This is a very strong result, it was ahead of our forecasts for every single commodity with the exception of petroleum and that was just a miss on the conventional volumes,'' he said.
Mr Young said he believed BHP's forecast of 207 million tonnes ofiron ore production next year was ''very conservative".
''We think they will beat that,'' he said.
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