(Bloomberg) ? Bermuda-registered Bunge Ltd., the world?s biggest oilseed processor, said third-quarter profit doubled as margins improved for the soybeans it crushes into vegetable oil and animal feed, and fertiliser prices improved. Shares rose to a record high.

Net income surged to $182 million, or $1.53 a share, from $89 million, or 88 cents, a year earlier, the White Plains, New York- based company said in a statement. Revenue rose 13 percent to $6.56 billion.

Bunge chief executive Alberto Weisser, 49, was able to bring idled soybean processing plants in the US back on line as futures prices for the oilseed dropped 22 percent during the quarter.

Profit from crushing a bushel of soybeans rose 43 percent.

Operating profit for its agribusiness unit, which includes soybean processing rose 90 percent to $129 million.

?Big crops are helping margins,? said George Foley, a fund manager at Glenmede Trust Co. in Philadelphia, which owns Bunge shares among its $14 billion in assets.

?I?m going into the quarter pretty happy.?

Shares of Bunge rose $2.72 or 6.3 percent, to $46.24 at 12:25 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, after earlier reaching $46.92, the highest since the company?s initial public offering in August 2001.

Yesterday?s gain is the biggest since July 29. The stock has climbed 67 percent from a year ago.

Bunge last month resumed operations at soybean processing plants in Destrehan, Louisiana, and Cairo, Illinois, after prices fell, chief financial officer Bill Wells said in an interview.

The plants were idled earlier this year as futures surged to a 15-year high of $10.64 a bushel in April.

Soybean prices have fallen since then, closing yesterday at $5.3375 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade, on expectations for a record or near record crop.

The US Agriculture Department on October 12 projected a harvest of 3.107 billion bushels, the biggest ever and up 27 percent from last year?s drought-damaged production.

?Futures markets are signalling good conditions for crush operations? in the months ahead, Wells said.

Operating profit for Bunge?s fertiliser unit nearly doubled to $155 million as the company sold products at higher prices.

Bunge is the biggest fertiliser seller in South America. ?I think people have been underestimating the chunk for fertiliser sales, especially in South America,? said Foley.

Bunge said third-quarter results included losses of $2 million, or 2 cents a share, as part of its efforts to shed its bakery operations.

Excluding those costs, the company earned $1.55 a share, compared with 82 cents, the average estimate of seven analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial.

Bunge boosted its 2004 net income forecast by $85 million, to between $440 million and $460 million, or $3.85 to $4.03 a share. Analysts surveyed by Thomson are predicting Bunge will earn $3.26 a share for the year.

The company said it expects per-share earnings to increase 10 percent to 12 percent annually for the five-year period beginning in 2004.

In a separate statement, Bunge yesterday said it agreed to purchase a grain terminal in the port of Rostov, Russia, from ZAO Trade Port, to more easily move exports to the Black Sea and Mediterranean regions and to the Middle East.

The company?s investment, including a planned expansion of the terminal, will be about $10 million, Bunge said in a statement.

The US Department of Agriculture estimates Russia?s grain exports may soar to 15.5 million tons by 2013, from 6 million tons in 2003, Bunge said.