Skip navigation

Landry’s losses narrow in 4th-Q

HOUSTON Landry’s Restaurants Inc. narrowed its fourth-quarter net loss from a year earlier on increased revenues and reduced losses from now discontinued operations, the company reported Tuesday.

Landry’s posted a net loss of $6.6 million for the quarter ended Dec. 31, compared with a loss of $8.4 million in the same period the year before. Per-share losses increased to 41 cents in the most recent quarter, from 39 cents a year earlier, as the company’s number of outstanding shares fell by about 27 percent.

Total revenues for Landry’s, which owns various casual-dining, hotel and gaming properties including Landry’s Seafood House, Chart House, Rainforest Cafe and the Golden Nugget Hotels and Casinos, increased 3.1 percent to $280.5 million. Same-store sales for the company’s restaurants fell 1 percent for the quarter.

In the latest quarter, the company booked $4.7 million in losses from its Joe’s Crab Shack chain, which it sold in 2006 after closing a number of outlets. A year earlier it had recorded losses of $11.6 million. Quarterly earnings from continuing operations, excluding Joe’s, dropped to a loss of $1.9 million from a profit of $3.2 million a year earlier, mainly on increased interest expenses. Landry’s pre-tax interest expense increased $8 million annually after a settlement with its note holders in August that raised the company’s interest rate from 7.5 percent to 9.5 percent. The increased borrowing costs trimmed quarterly earnings by 24 cents per share.

For all of 2007, Landry’s swung to a profit of $18.1 million, or 93 cents per share, from a loss of $21.8 million, or 99 cents per share, in 2006. Revenue rose to $1.17 billion in 2007 from $1.11 billion in 2006.

Landry’s said it would not provide earnings guidance for 2008 because of the company's higher interest rates and its need to secure additional long-term financing in a volatile credit market. The company also did not make a statement on the pending buyout proposal from chairman Tilman Fertitta, who made an offer in January to purchase the company’s outstanding shares and assume the company’s debt in a deal valued at $1.3 billion.

Hide comments

Comments

  • Allowed HTML tags: <em> <strong> <blockquote> <br> <p>

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
Publish