Alcoa Corp. AA, +0.36% stock rallied more than 6% in the extended session Wednesday after the aluminum and alumina producer reported second-quarter earnings above Wall Street expectations and said it had a “strong” first half of the year. Alcoa said it earned $549 million, or $2.95 a share, in the quarter, compared with $309 million, or $1.63 a share, in the year-ago period. Adjusted for one-time items, Alcoa earned $2.67 a share. Revenue rose to $3.6 billion from $2.8 billion a year ago.
Analysts polled by FactSet expected adjusted earnings of $2.31 a share on revenue of $3.5 billion. Alcoa said it expects aluminum segment shipments to remain unchanged from its earlier forecast of a range between 2.5 million metric tons and 2.6 million metric tons for the year. Alcoa cut its 2022 projections for alumina by 600,000 metric tons, seeing shipments in a range between 13.6 million metric tons and 13.8 million metric tons. Expectations for bauxite shipments were also dialed down, to between 44 million dry metric tons and 45 million dry metric tons, a change of 2 million dry metric tons from a prior projection “due to continuing disruptions in the Atlantic bauxite market and lower demand from refineries in the first half of 2022,” Alcoa said. Alcoa stock ended the regular trading day up 0.4%.