Chesapeake Has Ups and Downs All Around

There’s quite a mix of positive and negative news and results coming out of Chesapeake Energy Corp (NYSE:CHK) this week. Some results were lower than before and yet some expectations were still largely beat.

The bad

Chesapeake, based in Oklahoma City, saw its profits go down from $429 million in the fourth quarter of the previous posting year to $257 in the last fourth quarter. This equated to a drop from $0.63 per share to $0.39 per share.

The good

Even though profit dropped significantly, Chesapeake managed to beat analyst expectations. Excluding items, analysts had expected fourth-quarter profit to dip to $0.14 per share on average, whereas the actual result was nearly double that at $0.26 per share.

On the business end, Chesapeake saw some things going on that boded well for the future. Expenses for the company were down for the quarter, with general and administrative expenses dropping to $99 million — a $39 million year-on-year drop…