Monsanto Lays Off 900; Profit Slips (Update)

Overall during the call, significant attention was paid to the company's diminishing Roundup business.

When executives said those products will bring in gross profit of $1 billion in 2010, roughly half what it used to, analysts expressed concern that this would drag on financial results going forward. The Monsanto bosses, in turn, appeared to admit as much, even while striving to direct the conversation toward the company's seed business.

"The reality is that Roundup is going to [become] smaller, and more precipitously than expected," Monsanto's CEO, the Scotsman Hugh Grant, said in response to a question. "But getting lost in the Roundup drama, the danger is that you don't see the extraordinary growth that we're anticipating between now and 2012 in our seed business."

The company has indicated that, by 2012, it wants to achieve annual gross profit of as much as $8.8 billion, more than double the figure ($4.2 billion) it posted in 2007. And it wants to reach that goal on the back of its seeds and "traits," or specific genetic types of plant seeds that it has developed and patented.

In busy midday trading Wednesday, Monsanto stock had moved into red territory after initially trading higher on the session. The shares were changing hands recently at $77.58, down $1.72, or more than 2%, on volume of 8.5 million shares. Average daily turnover is 7.2 million.