Honda Q3 Profit Climbs; Cuts Full-year Unit Sales Outlook

(RTTNews) - Japanese automaker Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (HMC) Friday said profit for the third quarter increased significantly from the prior year, as revenue improved mainly due to higher automobile and motorcycle net sales.

Honda stuck to its financial forecast for fiscal year, but cut the sales outlook for vehicles citing challenging market conditions, mainly in emerging countries.

Net income attributable to the company for the quarter increased to 160.7 billion yen ($1.57 billion) from 77.4 billion yen in the previous year.

Operating income increased 73.2 percent to 228.5 billion yen, mainly due to the positive impact of new model introductions in Japan, North America, and Asia, as well as cost down effects and favorable currency effects. Operating margin improved to 7.6 percent from 5.4 percent.

Net sales and other operating revenue improved to 3.021 trillion yen from 2.426 trillion yen in the prior year, amid a rise in automobile and motorcycle net sales as well as the positive impact of foreign exchange effects.

Honda Group unit sales of motor cycles climbed 11.4 percent, and that of automobiles advanced 9.7 percent. Power product sales slid 2.8 percent.

The quarterly dividend for the third quarter will be 20 yen per share, up 1 yen from the same period last year.

For fiscal 2014, the company still expects net income attributable to the company to be 580 billion yen, due to an expected increase in equity in income of affiliates despite a decrease in other income.

The automaker still sees operating income of 780.0 billion yen, and net sales and other operating revenue of 12.10 trillion yen.

Honda said it was keeping the forecast for operating income as well as net sales and other operating revenue intact. This is due to expected decrease in automobile and motor cycle sales under a challenging market, especially in emerging countries, despite favorable currency effects associated with the depreciation of the yen.

However, Honda Group unit sales of motor cycles are now expected to be 17.095 million units, compared to the previous forecast of 17.320 million units.

For Automobiles, the forecast has been revised down to 4.385 million units from 4.430 million units. Power Products sales are estimated to be 6.050 million units, compared to the previous projection of 6.000 million units.

The stock fell 0.3 percent in Tokyo on Friday to close at 3,893 yen.