Wilmington, Del. -- DuPont's fourth-quarter earnings were dragged down by high costs for oil and other raw materials, though the chemical maker still managed to do better than Wall Street had expected. According to DuPont, it earned $261 million, or 25 cents per share, compared with a loss of $1.42 billion, or $1.36 per share, at the same time last year. DuPont approached Wall Street expectations of 46 cents per share, according to First Call/Thomson Financial. Similar to other chemical manufacturers, DuPont is dependent on oil, natural gas, and other petroleum byproducts and raw materials costs soared by $1.3 billion during the year, mostly on the price of crude oil. In addition, a strong overseas dollar hurt company profits, with the weak euro reducing quarterly earnings by 5 cents a share and by 15 cents a share for the year, DuPont said.