Honda profit fall fails to dampen prospects
The Japanese-owned car manufacturer Honda saw half year net profits slump by almost 80% to JPY 61.5 billion ($683m, £418m) compared with the same period in 2008. Motor cycle sales fell 17% while car sales were 15% down.
Honda said a 28.7% fall in revenue over the period was mainly due to decreased revenue in the automobile business and unfavorable currency translation effects. In Europe, the worst affected territory, revenue decreased by 39.2%.
Total motorcycle sales for the period totaled 4.7 million units while car sales for the fiscal first half totaled 1.6 million units.
However, the fall in second quarter profits was less steep than expected, and Honda confidently tripled its full-year profit forecast to JPY 155 billion ($1.7bn, £1bn) for the 12 month period to the end of March.
