Why Patterson-UTI Energy Stock Rose 10% and Then Declined 18%...All Before Lunch
Shares of energy services company Patterson-UTI Energy (NASDAQ: PTEN) rose out of the gate on April 24, jumping 10% at the open of trading on Wall Street. That followed days of gains, with the company's share price rising along with the price of oil. Including the early Friday gain, the stock was up roughly 50% in just five days. However, almost as quickly as the stock had jumped, it started to give back those gains and then some. By 11 a.m. the stock had fallen roughly 8% for the day. Although oil had been the driving force for the previous gains, earnings news was the likely cause of the quick change in perception as investors started to digest the company's financial results.
Patterson-UTI reported a first-quarter 2020 loss of $2.28 per share. That was much worse than the $0.14 per share it lost in the first quarter of 2019. The massive loss in the current quarter included $1.83 per share in one-time impairment charges. So the loss from ongoing operations was more along the lines of $0.45 per share -- a better number, but still much worse than the year-ago period.
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Source Fool.com
