Fluor Stock Dips at Hint of Delays in Major Projects : Corporations: Shares lose $2.75 after company says it expects record earnings but is unsure of start dates for three foreign oil and gas operations. That could mean a lag in orders.

IRVINE — Shares of Fluor Corp. closed lower Wednesday after the international engineering and construction giant said some of its larger international projects may be delayed.

Fluor’s stock lost $2.75 a share to close at $48 in New York Stock Exchange trading. The price had been as high as $56.25 a share during the summer.

Fluor Chairman Les McCraw told Wall Street analysts Tuesday at a meeting in New York that the company will report record earnings when its fiscal year-end results are released later this month.

He cautioned, however, that a growing number of Fluor’s larger international projects have uncertain start dates. This could create a lag in new orders, he said.

“When you’re talking about projects in another country, there are a ton of things that impact them, such as the local economy and political considerations,” Fluor spokeswoman Deborah Land said Wednesday from the company’s Irvine headquarters.

Fluor has several multibillion-dollar oil and gas projects underway in Indonesia, Kuwait and the Netherlands.

“Because these large projects may experience a slight delay, their orders may look a little lumpy. That’s what’s at stake here,” said Mark Altman, an analyst with Paine-Webber Inc. in New York.

“This is not that significant. We are still looking at strong earnings for the year end.”

For fiscal 1993, Fluor posted a profit of $166.8 million, or $2.03 a share, on revenue of $7.85 billion.

Altman predicts that the company will report earnings of about $190 million, or $2.35 a share, for the current year.