By Rhiannon Hoyle 
 

SYDNEY--BHP Group Ltd. (BHP.AU) said its annual net profit more than doubled because of strong iron-ore prices and large charges the year before that weren't repeated.

BHP, the world's largest listed miner by market value, posted a profit of US$8.31 billion for the 12 months through June. That compared to US$3.71 billion for the fiscal year prior when it absorbed US$5.23 billion in one-off items, linked to the writedown of its former U.S. shale assets, U.S. tax reform and a 2015 dam failure in Brazil.

BHP reported US$818 million in one-time charges for its latest fiscal year, mostly tied to the Brazilian dam failure.

Underlying profit rose by 2% to US$9.12 billion, the company said, missing the US$9.78-billion median of nine analysts' forecasts compiled by The Wall Street Journal.

BHP directors declared a final dividend of 78 U.S. cents a share, taking full-year ordinary dividends to US$1.33 a share. That exceeded a policy goal of paying out 50% of earnings to shareholders as dividends. Some analysts had expected a special dividend, which didn't materialize.

At US$9.2 billion, net debt at the end of June was below the company's stated US$10 billion-US$15 billion target range.

On Tuesday, BHP said it's now targeting net debt between US$12 billion and US$17 billion, following a change to accounting rules. Still, it expects net debt to remain at the lower end of this range in the near term.

"We enter the 2020 financial year with positive momentum and a strong outlook for both volume and cost," said Chief Executive Andrew Mackenzie.

BHP benefited from a boom in iron-ore prices during its fiscal year. The commodity recently surged to a five-and-a-half year high because of record steel production in China, the world's biggest steelmaking country, and disruptions to supplies of the steel ingredient.

In July, BHP said its own iron-ore production was flat during its fiscal year as record output at one mine was offset by setbacks from a cyclone and a train derailment. BHP is the world's No. 3 exporter of iron ore.

Its output of petroleum products was up slightly, although the company produced less copper and coal than in the year-earlier period.

 

-Write to Rhiannon Hoyle at rhiannon.hoyle@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

August 19, 2019 18:47 ET (22:47 GMT)

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