Mixed bag at BHP Billiton - UPDATE

There was something for both the bulls and the bears in mining titan BHP Billiton's interim results, with underlying pre-tax earnings ahead of expectations while the bottom line number was shy of what the market had been anticipating.

There was something for both the bulls and the bears in mining titan BHP Billiton's interim results, with underlying pre-tax earnings ahead of expectations while the bottom line number was shy of what the market had been anticipating.

The market had been expecting underlying earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) of $15.5bn for the six months to the end of 2011, but BHP Billiton topped that with $15.69bn, a 5.8% increase on the $14.83bn achieved the year before.

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