Baker Hughes' first-quarter profits beat expectations on the back of strong demand for natural Gas Technology

Baker Hughes, a U.S. oilfield technologies firm, beat Wall Street expectations for the first-quarter profits on Tuesday thanks to a robust demand for natural Gas technology.

The positive results are coming as oilfield service firms prepare for the impact of the tariffs introduced by the President Trump. These are expected to increase costs and disrupt sourcing of materials that are used in equipment such as drill pipes and artificial lifting systems.

As Big Tech invests billions in AI, demand for electricity has increased to power data centres. This demand for LNG is also increasing.

Baker Hughes is trying to leverage the Industrial and Energy Technology portfolio (IET) to drive growth and increase its presence in natural gas and LNG.

Baker Hughes saw orders for gas technology jump 17% and revenue in the industrial and energy technologies (IET segment) to $2.93billion.

The Houston-based firm provides customers with compressors, turbines and valves as well as other modular systems for gas processing.

Analysts told clients in advance of earnings season that Baker Hughes is least likely to be affected by commodity and tariff price fluctuations due to a 'heavy-backlog' within its IET segment.

According to LSEG, the company reported an adjusted profit per share of 51 cents for the three-month period ended March 31. This was compared with analysts' expectations of 48 cents. Reporting by Mrinalika Dhumal and Tanay in Bengaluru, Editing by Tasim Zaid and Alan Barona

(source: Reuters)