SAO PAULO, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Brazilian miner Vale

reported on Wednesday a $694 million loss in the

fourth quarter, missing estimates and swinging from a hefty

profit a year earlier, as it logged impairments on some of its

base metals assets in Canada.

Vale, one of the world's largest iron ore producers,

also cut its planned spending for this year and announced fresh

remuneration to shareholders through dividends and a share

buyback.

The firm's quarterly net loss, far below the $1.95 billion

profit expected by analysts in a LSEG poll and the $2.4 billion

profit a year earlier, was hit by impairments of $1.4 billion on

its Thompson nickel operations and $540 million on a project to

expand its Voisey's Bay mine, both in Canada.

Its core profit as measured by adjusted earnings before

interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) came in

at $3.79 billion in the quarter, down 41% and below analysts'

estimate of $3.96 billion.

Vale last month released its sales and production report,

which showed a near 5% decline in its quarterly iron ore output

compared to a year earlier, although the miner notched its

highest annual production since 2018 in the year.

In a separate filing on Wednesday, Vale trimmed its

projected capital expenditures for this year from $6.5 billion

to $5.9 billion.

The firm also announced the distribution of dividends

for about 2.14 reais per share and a share buyback of up to 120

million shares to be carried out over 18 months.