FLSmidth halves dividend, cautions 2016 revenue dip

(Adds mining context, share price, analyst, guidance)

COPENHAGEN, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Denmark's FLSmidth, which makes equipment for the beleaguered mining industry, said on Thursday it would more than halve its full-year dividend and signaled revenue could fall further this year.

The company reported fourth quarter operating profit of 279 million crowns ($42.3 million) on revenues of 5.3 billion, both in line with forecasts, but the dividend cut was steeper than analysts expected.

A proposed dividend of 4 Danish crowns per share for 2015 was lower than the 7.68 crowns expected by analysts and less than half the 9 Danish crowns offered the previous year.

FLSmidth said it expected its earnings before interest, tax and amortisation margin to slip in 2016 to 7 to 9 percent compared to 9.7 percent last year.

Revenue for 2016 was forecast at 17 to 20 billion Danish crowns, compared with 19.7 billion crowns generated in 2015.

"It looks tough for FLSmindth in 2016, which might suggest it ending up in the lower range of its guidance," said Michael Friis Jorgensen, analyst at Alm. Brand. "But the guidance reflects the huge uncertainty of the markets in which FLSmidth operates."

The mining industry has been blighted by persistently low commodity prices, leading firms to cut their capital expenditure.

"A dividend of 4 is a bit disappointing, compared to the capital FLSmidth is sitting on. But again, this reflects a management that's looking towards an uncertain future and thus would like to hold on to its balance," he said.

Its shares were down by as much as 2.9 percent after the results, but it was still outperforming the European basic resource sector index, which was 4.45 percent lower, dragged down by poor results from Rio Tinto (Other OTC: RTPPF - news) .

Dividend aside, the fourth quarter results were in line with analysts' forecasts, providing some support for the stock after the company missed forecasts in the previous quarter.

Shares (Berlin: DI6.BE - news) in Finnish peer, mining technology company Outotec (EUREX: 2729527.EX - news) , also fell on Thursday, sliding by as much as 9.4 percent on top of the 20 percent drop earlier this week when it reported lower-than-expected fourth quarter results. ($1 = 6.5946 Danish crowns) (Reporting by Nikolaj Skydsgaard and Annabella Nielsen; writing by Sabina Zawadzki, editing by Susanna Twidale)