  We have performed an in situ angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy
(ARPES) on single-crystal surfaces of La$_{0.6}$Sr$_{0.4}$MnO$_{3}$ (LSMO) thin
films grown on SrTiO$_{3}$ (001) substrates by laser molecular beam epitaxy,
and investigated the electronic structure near the Fermi level ($E_{F}$). The
experimental results were compared with the band-structure calculation based on
LDA + $U$. The band structure of LSMO thin films consists of several highly
dispersive O 2$p$ derived bands in the binding energy range of 2.0 - 6.0 eV and
Mn 3$d$ derived bands near $E_{F}$. ARPES spectra around the $Gamma$ point show
a dispersive band near $E_{F}$ indicative of an electron pocket centered at the
$Gamma$ point, although it was not so clearly resolved as an electronlike
pocket due to the suppression of spectral weight in the vicinity of $E_{F}$.
Compared with the band-structure calculation, the observed conduction band is
assigned to the Mn 3$de_{g}$ majority-spin band responsible for the
half-metallic nature of LSMO. We have found that the estimated size of the
Fermi surface is consistent with the prediction of the band-structure
calculation, while the band width becomes significantly narrower than the
calculation. Also, the intensity near $E_{F}$ is strongly reduced. The origin
of these discrepancies between the experiment and the calculation is discussed.
