Transocean Profit Falls by 33%

ZUG, Switzerland (TheStreet) -- Transocean(RIG Quote) announced Wednesday that its profit fell by a third from a year ago, while revenue dropped 11%, as the recession ate into demand for energy exploration.

The company has focused recently on what's considered the more lucrative area of the offshore-drilling business: exploring for oil and gas in deep water. Indeed, Transocean made some hay with that strategy in its latest quarter, saying that several new deepwater drillships boosted its revenue by $108 million compared with the second period of 2009.

Earlier this week, Transocean provided its monthly fleet summary, saying it was able to contract out an idled midwater rig, a segment that has suffered from softening rates. The company has idled many of its mid and shallow-water rigs this year. Deepwater, on the other hand, has become the hot spot over the last few years, with even traditional dry-bulk shipping outfit DryShips(DRYS Quote) attempting to get in on the action.

Year-over-year comparisons remain difficult for Transocean. Excluding a set of charges that amounted to 46 cents a share, the company posted earnings of $2.65 a share. Analysts were, on average, looking for EPS of $2.67 a share, though some forecasts were as high as $2.76 and others as low as $2.61.

Including the charges, which involved write-downs on the value of assets as well as legal costs, Transocean reported a bottom line of $710 million, or $2.19 a share. A year ago, the company earned $1.06 billion, or $3.30 a share