Alcan, the world's second-largest marker of primary aluminium, said it earned $81 million, or 21 cents a share in the quarter, down from $167 million, or 45 cents a share a year earlier.
Operating earnings were $197 million, or 53 cents a share, compared with $270 million, or 73 cents a share. Those figures included derivatives losses of 4 cents a share in the latest third quarter, compared with a gain of 4 cents a year earlier.
Analysts had expected Alcan to earn 48 cents a share, before gains or charges, according to Reuters Estimates.
Revenue fell to $4.9 billion in the quarter from $6.2 billion, mainly because of the spin-off of most of the company's aluminium-rolled products business to independent Novelis Inc in January.
Alcan said it had achieved its target of $360 million in annualised cost savings stemming from its take-over of Pechiney, three months sooner than planned.
Cost savings amounted to $62 million in the third quarter over the year-earlier quarter, for an annualised run rate of $352 million, the company said.
It expects to improve on the cost savings target over the rest of the year.
Alcan forecast world primary aluminium consumption to rise by 5.4 percent this year, while production from new capacity and restarts increased world supply by 7.1 percent.
The company maintained its forecast for a world market deficit in primary aluminium of about 200,000 tonnes in 2005.
The average price Alcan obtained on ingot sales was $1,959 a tonne in the third quarter, up $79 a tonne or 4.2 percent from a year earlier, but down $75 a tonne or 3.7 percent from the second quarter of this year, the company said.
Cash from operating activities was $697 million, down from $713 million a year earlier.