ABB ABB Ltd

   By Nathan Allen 
 

Shares in ABB Ltd. (ABBN.EB) jumped more than 5% Thursday morning, after the Swiss engineer reported first-quarter order growth across all units, as well as increased sales and stronger margins.

Total orders rose 6% to $9.8 billion for the quarter, thanks in part to an 11% rise in orders booked by the robotics-and-motion unit.

Base orders--contracts valued at less than $15 million--drove overall order growth, leading analysts at Vontobel to comment that "large orders are still missing."

The trend is set to continue through 2018, as large orders are unlikely to pick up until 2019, when several companies announce tenders, Chief Executive Ulrich Spiesshofer said on a conference call.

First-quarter revenue was $8.63 billion, up 1% on year and 3% ahead of consensus, while net profit fell to $572 million from $724 million a year earlier.

ABB said the lower profit was due to a tough comparison effect with the first quarter of 2017, when the company booked gains from the divestment of its cables business. Stripping out the effects of the transaction, ABB said its net profit grew 10% to $699 million.

Analysts at Morgan Stanley said the results were "good enough," but pointed out that the consensus beat was largely down to foreign-exchange tailwinds.

At 0927 GMT ABB shares were up 4.9%, at CHF23.67.

Nevertheless, Jefferies says it still sees better prospects elsewhere, and expects other European capital-goods companies to report stronger numbers this quarter.

Write to Nathan Allen at nathan.allen@dowjones.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 19, 2018 06:00 ET (10:00 GMT)

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