Altria Group Inc. (MO – Free Report) came out with fourth-quarter 2017 results, wherein it continued its robust trend of year-over-year bottom-line growth. Further, the company issued a favorable earnings outlook for 2018.

If we look into Altria’s stock performance in the past three months, we note that this Zacks Rank #3 (Hold) stock has rallied 11.1%, in comparison with the industry’s growth of 7.8%.

Quarter in detail

Adjusted earnings of 91 cents per share surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 80 cents. Also, earnings surged 33.8% year over year, on the back of greater equity earnings from the company’s beer investments related to AB InBev (BUD –Free Report) , higher adjusted operating companies income (“OCI”) in the smokeable and smokeless segments, lower outstanding shares and reduced adjusted tax rate.

Altria Group Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
 

Altria Group Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise | Altria Group Quote

However, net revenues fell more than 2% to $6,083 million in the quarter, owing to soft net revenues in the smokeable products segments. Revenues net of excise taxes remained almost flat at $4,696 million. The Zacks Consensus Estimate was $4,793 million.

Management stated that Altria remains focused on enhancing its non-combustible product portfolio for authorization by the FDA.

In e-vapor, Altria’s subsidiary Nu Mark LLC continues to boost MarkTen volume, which expanded 60% in full-year 2017, courtesy of greater distribution and category growth. MarkTen’s full-year 2017 national retail market share was approximately 12.5% in mainstream retail channels. Further, it forms nearly 70% of e-vapor volumes in those channels.

The company also made considerable progress in smokeless and other oral nicotine-containing products. Also, in heated tobacco, Phillip Morris (PM – Free Report) remains committed toward making plans to commercialize IQOS, which it will exclusively sell in the U.S. upon FDA’s approval.