Williams Swings to Loss

Williams Cos. swung to third-quarter loss as the pipeline giant was hurt by a write-down and a decline in revenue.

The Tulsa, Okla., company is being acquired by Energy Transfer Equity LP in a $32.6 billion deal that will create a massive U.S. network of natural-gas pipelines. The firms will have a combined network of more than 100,000 miles of oil and gas pipelines crisscrossing the continent.

As a result of the pending deal, Williams withdrew its previous 2015 outlook and said it no longer will provide financial guidance.

Williams offers Energy Transfer more access to the northeastern U.S., where connections are needed to bring surging output from the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania to New York and New England.

As part of the deal, Williams is abandoning a plan it announced last May to buy its affiliated partnership, Williams Partners LP, in a $13.8 billion deal.

Overall, Williams reported a loss of $40 million, or 5 cents a share, compared with a year-earlier profit of $1.68 billion, or $2.22 a share. Excluding one-time items such as the write-down in the latest quarter and a big-one time gain in the year earlier period, per-share earnings from continuing operations rose to 22 cents from 21 cents. Revenue decreased 13% to $1.8 billion.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected per-share profit of 22 cents and revenue of $1.94 billion.

Write to Tess Stynes at [e-mail]

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 28, 2015 17:55 ET (21:55 GMT)

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