Sumitomo Metal Mining Enjoys Favorable Profits in 1H

Sumitomo Metal Mining announced on Friday the firm posted 95.243 billion yen of consolidated recurring profit for the first half of fiscal 2006 ending March 2007, which increased to 2.6 times from 1H of fiscal 2005. The firm enjoyed 46.2 billion yen of profit increase thanks to price surge of nonferrous metals such as copper and nickel. The firm also gained 9.6 billion yen from investment profit on equity method for overseas mines such as Candelaria copper mine.The firm posted 460.491 billion yen of consolidated net sales for 1H of fiscal 2006, which increased by 69% from the same period of fiscal 2005, 79.79 billion yen of consolidated operating profit, increasing to 2.7 times, and 61.356 billion yen of consolidated net profit which increased to 2.6 times. Both sales and profits hit records.The mineral resources business unit posted 15.9 billion yen of operating profit for 1H of fiscal 2006, increasing to 2.9 times from the same period of fiscal 2005. The metals business unit posted 54.9 billion yen of operating profit, which increased to 3.3 times from a year ago. The electronic and advanced materials business unit posted 8.1 billion yen, which increased by 88% from 1H of fiscal 2005 thanks to the brisk demand.