** Specialty chemicals company Celanese drops 17% to $102.34 premarket

** Co temporarily cuts quarterly dividend by ~95%, lays out additional cost-cut plans following a profit slump

** Says the dividend reduction would support deleveraging and along with its plans to cut additional costs would help it save more than $75 mln by the end of 2025

** Q3 net earnings fell about 87% to $120 mln, as co's engineered materials $(EM)$ segment was impacted by rapid slowdowns in commercial activity in both automotive and industrial segments

** CE expects improvement to free cash flow next year without visibility to earnings from lower costs, elevated cash tax etc. - Citi

** Citi analysts say there are still questions around the long-term earnings power in the EM segment and balance sheet pressure

** CE has a dividend yield of 2.27% compared to peer Dow's

yield of 5.84%, per LSEG data

** The average rating of 24 brokerages covering CE is "hold"; median PT $56

** Stock down 20.5% YTD, compared with S&P 500's near 20% advance

(Reporting by Medha Singh)

((medha.singh@thomsonreuters.com))