Writedowns Expand Losses at MDS

Article Excerpt

MDS INC. $7.43 (Toronto symbol MDS; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Consumer sector; Shares outstanding: 121.1 million; Market cap: $899.8 million; Price-to-sales ratio: 0.5; SI Rating: Average) lost $233 million or $1.91 a share in the fiscal year ended October 31, 2008 (all amounts except share price and market cap in U.S. dollars). The loss was mainly due to writedowns, including a $246 million after-tax charge related to the company’s investment in the troubled Maple medical-isotope reactor project. These were non-cash accounting adjustments, and had no effect on MDS’s cash balances of $120 million or $0.99 a share. MDS lost $25 million or $0.19 a share in the prior fiscal year. If you exclude unusual items, earnings per share would have fallen 51.2%, to $0.21 from $0.43. Revenue rose 8.7%, to $1.3 billion from $1.2 billion. MDS is a hold. hold…