Alliant reports earnings rose 35% in quarter

Alliant Techsystems Inc., which has 4,585 Utah employees at seven facilities, said first-quarter earnings rose 35 percent on increased bullet sales for the Iraq war. The shares had the biggest gain in 3 1/2 years after the company increased its full-year profit forecast.

Net income beat analysts' projections, climbing to $52.4 million, or $1.50 a share, from $38.9 million, or $1.09, a year earlier. Revenue grew 16 percent to $958.4 million in the quarter ended July 1, the company, based in Edina, Minn., said Thursday.

The company's ammunition group increased sales 17 percent in the period because of orders for M-16 rifle bullets for U.S. troop training and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Alliant is expanding rocket sales to the NASA Ares I program, which will power the spacecraft that replace the U.S. fleet of space shuttles.

Shares of Alliant jumped $5.71, or 5.5 percent, to close at $109.76 on the New York Stock Exchange.

The average of 12 analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg was for earnings of $1.36 a share. Analysts, on average, projected sales would rise to $893.6 million, from $822.4 million a year earlier.

Sales and profit climbed at all three of the company's units in the quarter. Based on that performance, Alliant raised its full-year earnings forecast to $6.15 to $6.25 a share, from $5.95 to $6.15. The company also increased its sales prediction to $4 billion to $4.1 billion, from $3.85 billion to $3.95 billion.

Analysts, on average, projected earnings of $6.23 a share on revenue of $3.91 billion.

Over the next two to three years, Alliant plans to increase sales 8 percent to 10 percent annually, Murphy said on a conference call.

Sales at Alliant's launch-systems division climbed 15 percent to $305.1 million on increased work on NASA's Ares I rocket program. Operating profit gained 19 percent to $44.8 million. Alliant is also the only builder of the reusable solid-rocket motors on the current fleet of space shuttles.

---

Contributing: Brian Sullivan