Westlake Corporation Declares Quarterly Dividend Despite ‘Lackluster’ Q3 Earnings

$0.50 per share dividend declared payable on Dec. 6

Westlake Corp. Declares $0.50 dividend per share for 2023 Q3 — Westlake Corporation reported a third-quarter 2023 profit of $285 million or $2.20 per share, down from $401 million or $3.10 per share in the year-ago quarter.
— Image by Bryan Gottlieb/RC

Westlake Corporation [NYSE: WLK] announced on Friday that its Board of Directors had declared a regular dividend distribution of 50 cents per share for the third quarter of 2023. The dividend will be payable on December 6, 2023, to stockholders of record on November 21, 2023.

The distribution is the 77th successive quarterly dividend that Westlake has declared since completing its initial public offering in August 2004. Year-to-date, Westlake is up nearly 20%, outperforming the S&P 500 by more than five points. Shares opened down Monday morning by 0.24% and, at press time, were trading at $121.69 per share.

Westlake reported $3.12 billion in revenue for the quarter ended September 2023, representing a year-over-year decline of 21.3%. EPS of $2.20 for the same period compares to $3.10 a year ago.

The reported revenue represents a surprise of -6.45% over the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $3.33 billion, according to Zacks Equity Research. With the consensus EPS estimate being $1.92, the EPS surprise was +14.58%. Here is how Westlake performed in the just reported quarter in terms of the metrics most widely monitored and projected by Wall Street analysts:

Net external sales — Performance and Essential Materials: $1.97 billion versus the five-analyst average estimate of $2.16 billion. The reported number represents a year-over-year change of -27.3%.
Net external sales — Housing and Infrastructure Products: $1.14 billion versus the five-analyst average estimate of $1.16 billion; the reported number represents a year-over-year change of -8.1%.
Net external sales — Performance and Essential Materials: Performance materials $1.13 billion versus the three-analyst average estimate of $1.17 billion. Essential materials: $844 million compared to the $965.84 million average estimate based on three analysts.
Net external sales — Housing and Infrastructure Products: Housing products: $963 million versus the two-analyst average estimate of $998.91 million. Infrastructure products: $181 million versus $205.67 million estimated by two analysts on average.

EBITDA

Housing and Infrastructure Products: $327 million compared to the $224.43 million average estimate based on three analysts.
Performance and Essential Materials: $339 million versus $448.77 million estimated by three analysts on average.

For more information, visit westlake.com.

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Bryan Gottlieb is the online editor at Engineering News-Record (ENR).

Gottlieb is a five-time Society of Professional Journalists Excellence in Journalism award winner with more than a decade of experience covering business, construction, and community issues. He has worked at Adweek, managed a community newsroom in Santa Monica, Calif., and reported on finance, law, and real estate for the San Diego Daily Transcript. He later served as editor-in-chief of the Detroit Metro Times and was managing editor at Roofing Contractor, where he helped shape national industry coverage.

Gottlieb covers breaking news, large-scale infrastructure projects, new products and business.