BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Business First Bancshares, Inc. (BFST) on Thursday reported third-quarter earnings of $20.5 million.

The Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based bank said it had earnings of 76 cents per share. Earnings, adjusted for non-recurring gains, were 71 cents per share.

The results surpassed Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of four analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 62 cents per share.

The company posted revenue of $103.2 million in the period. Its revenue net of interest expense was $65.2 million, which also beat Street forecasts. Three analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $63.2 million.

Business First shares have fallen 16% since the beginning of the year. In the final minutes of trading on Thursday, shares hit $18.60, a decrease of 20% in the last 12 months.

_____

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on BFST at https://www.zacks.com/ap/BFST

For copyright information, check with the distributor of this item, STATS Perform dba Automated Insights. , source Associated Press News