Japanese steelmaker Kobe Steel Ltd (Kobe) has issued its financial results for the first nine months ended December 31 of the fiscal year 2014-15.
For the given period, Kobe Steel has reported a net profit of JPY 64.11 billion ($545.05 million), rising 0.5 percent year on year. The company's consolidated net sales revenues for the first nine months of the current fiscal year amounted to JPY 1.37 trillion ($11.65 billion), up 3.7 percent year on year.
Kobe Steel produced 5.6 million mt of crude steel in the period in question, down 0.2 percent year on year. Kobe's steel product sales volume in the given period decreased by 3.66 percent to 4.47 million mt, compared to the first nine months of the financial year 2013-14, due to a decrease in demand from the automotive sector brought about by a reaction to the last-minute surge in demand prior to the rise in the consumption tax on April 1, 2014.
According to Kobe Steel, consolidated operating income and net income are anticipated to increase for the entire financial year owing to a downward trend in steel raw material prices and improvements of profits and losses in subsidiaries.