Posts Tagged ‘shaw group’

Forbes is reporting that an analyst at J.P. Morgan has downgraded Shaw Group, a Baton Rouge-based Fortune 500 company, and cut the 2010 earnings estimate due to reduced demand in a few of their numerous industries. However, Shaw Group still remains strong in many areas, including their commercial nuclear construction divisions, which was recently given a contract to build a nuclear power plant in China. Such industries as this strengthen the durability of a conglomerate despite other weakening industries because the market is limited and the scope of the contracts is enormous. Shaw’s stock dropped about 5.5% at the time of publication because of this.

Shaw Super Hero

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Big news in the Baton Rouge economy today.

Today the employment numbers were released for the state. Overall, the state lost 8,000 jobs, 6,700 of those non-farm. The state’s unemployment rate went up from 5.8% to 6.2%, and up from 4.1% a year ago. Baton Rouge, however, added 800 jobs over 2008, thought we lost 2,100 in March over 2008. Of course, this isn’t much of a surprise. Earlier this month, we reported the loss of jobs by several major firms in Baton Rouge. Now, it’s clear that the national recession is finally catching up to Louisiana. It’s good to see our local economy still faring well. Forbes noted Baton Rouge’s propensity for job density last week when it honored Baton Rouge with a place in the top college towns in America.

In other news, Shaw Group, Baton Rouge’s Fortune 500 company, announced a major five-year, $375 million contract with the US Department of Homeland Security. The contract is for emergency services, including housing, construction and engineering services, mass care and planning, staffing and logistics, for FEMA during disasters in Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

Fortune released their annual Fortune 500 list today, which “ranks the top 500 U.S. closely held and public corporations as ranked by their gross revenue after adjustments made by Fortune to exclude the impact of excise taxes companies collect.” (Wikipedia) Big oil company ExxonMobil knocked off Wal-Mart to take the coveted number one position.

Amongst the top 500 companies are two from Louisiana (Entergy and the Shaw Group), with an additional four in the top 1000 (CenturyTel, Albemarle, Superior Energy Services and Pool). The Shaw Group is Baton Rouge’s claim to fame. At number 357, the Shaw Group posted $6,998,000,000 in revenue—in millions, by the way—which is a 22.3% increase from 2007. (Fortune) The year has been good to the Shaw Group, which moved up 69 spots. Albemarle is Baton Rouge’s other company in the top 1000 list at number 806. Moving up 18 spots from last year, Albemarle is a chemical company that posted $2,467,100,000. in revenue.

It’s good to see Louisiana putting on a strong show. It’s great to see Baton Rouge showing highly as well (the two companies from Baton Rouge are more highly ranked than the New Orleans ones). It’s important to note that we’re not last on this list. In fact, there are ten states that do not have a Fortune 500 company listed. However, our neighbor, Texas, is number one on the list with 64 companies.

Good job, Louisiana.

You can see more of the Louisiana companies on the list on Fortune’s web site. You can view the full list on Fortune’s web site.