Eaton Vance Misses Street in 3Q as Outflows Grow

Eaton Vance (NYSE:EV) missed Wall Street sales and earnings expectations in the third quarter as more people withdrew their money than invested, launching a selloff on Wednesday that has pushed its shares down about 3%.

The Boston-based investment fund manager posted on Wednesday net income of $50.2 million, or 43 cents a share, compared with a year-earlier profit of $52.87 million, or 44 cents. The results fell short of average analyst estimates of 46 cents in a Thomson Reuters poll.

Revenue for the three months ended July 31 was $298.7 million, down from $327 million a year ago, missing the Street’s view of $304 million. Investment advisory and administrative fees fell 2% year-over-year while distribution and service fees declined by 3%.

Eaton Vance suffered from $1.4 billion in outflows compared with $1.9 billion in new money from the same period the year before. Outflows from Eaton Vance’s large-cap were $3.8 billion, more than offsetting the $2.4 billion of inflows.

"Accelerating outflows from our large-cap value strategy caused net flows to turn negative in the third quarter of fiscal 2012," Eaton Vance CEO Thomas Faust said in a statement.

However, Faust said improving large-cap value performance and a "robust pipeline of new institutional and sub-advisory opportunities" have helped the company turn optimistic on "flow trends in the coming months."

While assets under management were $192.9 billion as of July 31, a decrease of 3% the year earlier, Eaton Vance completed a purchase of 49% interest in Hexavest earlier this month.

The Quebec-based equity manager with more than $11 billion in client assets is expected to help expand Eaton Vance's product offerings in the U.S. and in offshore markets.