Deere’s Profit Rises 46%

The quarterly results beat analysts’ expectations, and Deere shares rose nearly 4 percent on a down day on Wall Street.

The company said Wednesday that equipment sales were up 20 percent in the quarter. That included 14 percent sales growth in the United States and Canada, and 31 percent growth in the rest of the world outside those two countries.

The sales growth helped Deere generate net income of $670 million, or $1.62 a share, for the three months ended Oct. 31, up from $457 million, or $1.07 a share, a year ago.

Revenue grew 20 percent to $8.6 billion, from $7.2 billion a year ago. Both sales volume and equipment prices increased.

Analysts surveyed by FactSet expected earnings of $1.43 a share on revenue of $7.91 billion.

Deere said equipment sales would increase about 15 percent in the 2012 fiscal year and profit would grow to $3.2 billion, from $2.8 billion in the 2011 fiscal year.

The earnings statement from Deere, the world’s largest maker of agricultural equipment, offers an indication of how well farmers worldwide are doing. Deere said it expected farmers to have another good year in 2012 because the demand for agricultural commodities remained strong.

Deere said it projected that net American farm income would decline slightly to roughly $109.2 billion in 2012, from the estimated $115.7 billion in 2011.

To help meet the growing demand, Deere announced plans in 2011 to build new manufacturing plants in Brazil, China and India.

For Deere’s 2011 fiscal year, the company reported net income of $2.8 billion, or $6.63 a share. That is higher than the previous year’s $1.87 billion.

Its shares rose $2.80 to $74.72 on Wednesday.

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