Singapore firms failed to meet profit targets for three consecutive quarters

Here's how each sector fared.

According to CIMB, Singapore's 3Q corporate profits missed expectations for the third consecutive quarter. The beat-to-miss ratio fell again to 0.5x from 0.6x in 2Q13. The misses were in the industrial, consumer and developer sectors.

For the consumer sector, revenues appeared to be hurt by competition and currency fluctuations (in the region) while for the industrial sector, execution of orders seemed to be a bit of a problem. The beats were among financials and REITs.

Here's more from CIMB:

Among industrials, Cosco missed expectations on the back of an inventory writedown while Sembmarine got hit by the correspondingly-weak Cosco earnings but also had lower-than-expected margins. Sembcorp Industries got dragged down along with them.

Other shipyard or offshore and marine plays that did badly included Vard and Swiber. ST Engineering had a miss due to a weaker land systems division. In the consumer sector, the highlight miss was Super Group, which was hit by currency issues and competition.

Courts did badly as business slowed. Others like Del Monte and SMRT Overseas Education had one-off expenses or higher operating costs to grapple with while Venture's sales were slow.

The consumer and manufacturing spaces were not the only ones to be hit by weaker regional currencies. SingTel was the big-cap worst affected by the currency-drivenearnings drag.

In the property sector, CDL-HT cited a challenging hotel market and City Developments had higher margins and warned that development margins will continue to be squeezed. Capitaland
was hit by higher project costs.

Among the banks, OCBC beat expectations by the largest quantum due to a strong quarter of gains from GEH. Core earnings for the whole sector were respectable. SGX had unexpectedly lower costs and hence a good quarter.

Among the REITs that did well were FCT, MCT and MINT; higher rental rates contributed. Keppel had a good quarter as margins started to head up.

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