LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Hormel Foods lost some ground in early trade on Thursday after the company revealed its third-quarter sales had fallen short of expectations on the Street, leading it to cut its outlook for the full year.
The Minnesota-based branded foods company saw net income rise 15% to $210.2m, or $0.39 per share, matching consensus estimates, and sales grew 7% to a record $2.36bn, which, while an all-time high, was still shy of analysts' estimates of $2.39bn.

Hormel's refrigerated foods sales jumped 10% to $1.20bn, again short of the consensus $1.24bn reading, while grocery products sales slipped 0.2% to $617.7 m, but beat expectations of $578.8m.

Hormel reaffirmed its 2018 earnings per share guidance of $1.81 to $1.95, but decided to drop its sales outlook for the full year to $9.4bn to $9.6bn from its previous estimate of $9.7bn to $10.1bn as a result of "volatility due to tariffs and broader industry dynamics."

The maker of Spam highlighted that increasing supplies of beef, chicken and pork supplies was weighing on meat companies' profit margins, forcing them to slash prices in order to prevent their stockpiles from rising.

As of 1500 BST, Hormel shares were down 3.80% to $37.06 each.

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