Yokohama Raises Half-Year Projections

Projections made by Yokohama Rubber on July 30 for its consolidated net sales and earnings in the first half of the current financial year have been raised to reflect accelerated progress in cost cutting and an increased sales forecast. For the six-months between April 1 and September 30, 2010, the company now anticipates that the 3.9 billion yen (£29.2 million) net loss experienced in the first half of the previous financial year will “shrink to approximately zero.” Company management expects operating income to be 6.3 billion yen (£47.2 million), as opposed to an operating loss of 4 billion yen a year earlier.

Yokohama’s projections call for net sales to increase 18.3 per cent over the same period of the previous fiscal year, to 239.0 billion yen (£1.8 billion). The projection for net income is a 1.4 billion yen improvement over the projection announced on July 30, 2010. Yokohama has raised the projection for operating income by 57.5 per cent and the projection for net sales 0.4 per cent. The company will announce its full-year fiscal projections on November 1, 2010, when it will release its interim business and financial results.