Japan Major Smelters Post Profit Jump for April-June

Japanese 8 major nonferrous smelters posted much higher profit and sales for April-June under surging metal prices. Nippon Mining Holdings, which is parent company of Nippon Mining & Metals, Mitsui Mining & Smelting and Furukawa revised the outlook upward when their business including electronic materials enjoy worldwide economy growth along with higher metal prices. Other 5 firms are likely to revise the full year outlook at announcement for half year results after they posted higher profit than expected. Toho Zinc posted 2.9 times higher recurring profit for April-June from same period of 2005. The profit increased to 2.7 times for Furukawa, 2.4 times for Sumitomo Metal Mining, 83% jump for Nittetsu Mining, 78% up for Mitsubishi Materials, 16% increase for Mitsui Mining & Smelting. They enjoyed favorable market after 7 companies posted record results for fiscal 2005. The 3 major copper smelters’ metal units including minerals and copper fabricating increased the operating profit for April-June from same period of 2005. The profit increased to 3.1 times at 30.842 billion yen for Sumitomo Metal Mining, 2.2 times at 11.781 billion yen for Nippon Mining & Metals and 2.6 times at 8.001 billion yen for Mitsubishi Materials. The smelters expected the copper ingot price would be around 200 US cents per pound for April-September. However, the actual price could be much higher when the average monthly price was 290 US cents for April, 365 US cents for May, 326 US cents for June and 350 US cents for July at settlement of London Metal Exchange.