Yahoo Finance

Boeing (BA) reported third quarter earnings on Wednesday that missed consensus expectations, as fallout from the aerospace giant’s idled 737 Max plane continued to weigh on results.

Here were the numbers for Boeing’s third quarter, compared to Bloomberg-compiled estimates:

• Revenue: $20 billion vs. $19.65 billion expected

• Adj. earnings per share: $1.45 vs. $2.17 expected

However, Bloomberg said Boeing’s core earnings and revenue may not compare with estimates.

The grounding of the 737 Max jet, linked to 2 deadly crashes, cost Boeing another $900 million during the third quarter. It brought the total to $9.2 billion, though Boeing cited a boost in Q3 from higher defense and services revenue that helped offset losses from its flagship plane.

The company insisted that its base-case scenario involves getting the 737 Max back in the air sometime before year’s end — even as it saw the departure of a high-ranking executive this week amid more questions about whether Boeing misled regulators about the plane’s woes.

“Our top priority remains the safe return to service of the 737 MAX, and we’re making steady progress,” CEO Dennis Muilenburg said in a statement. “We’ve also taken action to further sharpen our company’s focus on product and services safety, and we continue to deliver on customer commitments and capture new opportunities with our values of safety, quality and integrity always at the forefront.”

Underscoring its commitment to the embattled plane, Boeing also plans to gradually increase the 737 production rate from 42 per month to 57 per month by late 2020, it said.

The list of issues surrounding the 737 Max jets continues to grow. On Tuesday, Boeing said that it conducted more than 800 flights with updated 737 Max software, adding that it conducted a “dry run” of a Max certification flight test last week.

However, Boeing also announced that Kevin McAllister, head of the jetliner division, is stepping down and will be replaced by Stan Deal, head of Boeing’s global services business. Deal is someone with extensive sales and supplier-management experience and is seen as an executive that could help Boeing deal with one of the biggest crises in its more than 100 year history.

McAllister’s departure is the first high-level departure since the start of the 737 Max crisis. The news comes on the heels of an announcement on October 11 that Muilenburg would be stripped of his chairman title, and a Wall Street Journal report suggested Boeing may not have been honest with regulators about the plane’s troubles.

The stock, a Dow (^DJI) component, was volatile in pre-market action, falling by more than 1% before recovering. Boeing’s shares may weigh on blue-chip stocks at the opening bell, given that fellow bellwether Caterpillar also missed expectations.