Ford Profit Falls: Hot Trends

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Popular searches on the Internet include Ford (F) after the automaker posted near-record profit in North America but showed declines in every other area of the world.

Excluding items, Ford posted pretax operating profit of $1.8 billion, or 30 cents a share. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters had estimated 28 cents. Net income was $1.04 billion, down 57% from a year earlier. Revenue fell 6% to $33.3 billion; analysts had estimated $32.2 billion.

Pretax operating profit declined to $1.8 billion from $2.8 billion in the same quarter a year earlier.

Ford's most troubled area was in Europe. Ford Europe revenue declined to $7.1 billion from $9 billion, and the company posted a pretax operating loss of $404 billion, compared with a $176 million gain a year earlier. Operating margin was negative 5.8%.

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WellPoint (WLP) is trending as the health insurer posted second-quarter profit that missed expectations and announced it is cutting its full-year earnings forecast.

Net income fell to $643.6 million, or $1.94 a share, from $701.6 million, or $1.89 per share, a year earlier. Excluding items, WellPoint reported earnings of $2.04 a share, 4 cents below estimates.

WellPoint said forecast full-year earnings per share of $7.30 to $7.40, compared to its previous forecast of at least $7.57 a share. The company attributed its lowered guidance to a decline in enrollment and higher medical costs. The insurer said it still expects its medical cost trends to come in at the high end of its forecast, while its enrollment would suffer more due to competition. WellPoint now expects year-end enrollment of about 33.4 million, about 200,000 less than its previous estimate.

WellPoint is the nation's second-largest health insurer.

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Wal-Mart (WMT) is another popular search. The retailer has said it opposes a pending $6 billion settlement reached by Visa (V) and MasterCard (MA) over numerous lawsuits filed by retailers against the companies for credit-card fees.

The settlement puts to bed charges that card issuers fixed merchants' fees for accepting credit cards. Under the settlement, retailers will be able to charge customers more for using credit cards, so stores no longer bear the brunt of fees they have had to pay credit card companies.

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