Owens Corning Slips After Roofing Prompts Lower Earnings Outlook

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of building materials maker Owens Corning (OC)are falling after the company cut its guidance for its full-year 2014 earnings before interest and taxes.

WHAT'S NEW: Owens Corning reduced its FY14 EBIT outlook to $416M from $500M as well as slashed its roofing volumes guidance for the first half of this year to be 20% lower than volumes in the same period of last year. The company expects to recover a portion of this volume shortfall in the second half of the year, but noted that continued weakness in the second quarter has introduced further uncertainty in the FY14 financial outlook for the company's roofing business. The company continues to see improvement in the year-over-year performance of both its insulation and composites businesses. Earnings growth in these two businesses is expected to more than offset the weaker financial performance in the roofing business year-over-year, Owens Corning noted.

WHAT'S NOTABLE: Three days ago, Goldman upgraded the building products sector to Attractive from Neutral based on reduced expectations and accelerating U.S. macroeconomic conditions. The firm said that non-residential construction is at an inflection and it expects existing homes sales growth to increase. As part of the sector change, the firm upgraded Armstrong World (AWI)to Conviction Buy from Buy and downgraded Ply Gem (PGEM)to Sell from Neutral.

OTHERS TO WATCH: Others in the building materials space include Masco Corporation (MAS), Beacon Roofing Supply (BECN)and Louisiana-Pacific (LPX).

PRICE ACTION: During morning trading, shares of Owens Corning fell $1.90 or 4.6%, to $39.40. Meanwhile, Masco was down 1.8% and Beacon Roofing Supply was down 3.6%.

Reporting by Gina Gioldassis.

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Owens Corning Slips After Roofing Prompts Lower Earnings Outlook