WARSAW, Indiana — Shares of Symmetry Medical Inc. fell 18 percent today after the maker of orthopedic implants and related instruments slashed its 2009 profit and revenue outlooks.
Symmetry Medical shares fell $1.72 to $7.84 on the New York Stock Exchange. More than 4.6 million shares traded hands, which was 18 times normal trading volume.
Order flow has fallen at Symmetry Medical in recent weeks. The company expects customer demand to remain muted in orthopedic and non-orthopedic markets for the remainder of 2009. It has lowered annual revenue guidance by about 9 percent to a range of $355 million to $365 million, from $385 million to $405 million.
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In terms of profit, Symmetry Medical will continue to cut costs in response to reduced demand, the company said. It expects 2009 earnings per share to be in the range of 63 cents to 68 cents per diluted share, down about 19 percent from the previously announced range of 77 cents to 85 cents per diluted share.
“In anticipation of a softer overall orthopedic market in the second half of 2009, we had previously guided for a decrease in revenue and proactively implemented cost adjustments to maintain our earnings goals,” said Brian Moore, Symmetry Medical’s president and CEO, in a written statement. “Since our previous guidance announcement, and particularly in recent weeks, we have experienced greater than anticipated order reductions. We believe this change in order flow will result in a significant shortfall to our revenue and earnings per share, primarily in the fourth quarter.”
Despite softening customer demand across all of its business segments, “we are encouraged by gains in market share we have realized as our customers consolidate suppliers and focus on assuring product quality and supplier stability,” Moore said. Some of those share gains came from customers using up inventories. “While this created negative implications for our business in the near term, it should bode well for Symmetry in the future,” he said.
“In addition, our customers have placed a much renewed emphasis on supply-chain management and have engaged us in discussions on our contribution to this process,” Moore said. “We see these expanding relationships resulting in a mid- to long-term positive impact on our business.”
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Symmetry Medical sells  implants and related instruments, and cases to the orthopedic device industry. The company also makes these products for companies in other segments of the medical device market, including arthroscopy, dental, laparoscopy, osteobiologic and endoscopy. It also provides some specialized products and services to non-health care markets, such as the aerospace market.
The company expects to report its third-quarter earnings on Nov. 5.