Japan 5 Major Stainless Makers Post Lower Profit in F2005

Japanese major 5 stainless steel makers were suffered from higher raw materials price and lower shipment in fiscal 2005 ended March 2005, according to their results. The inventory adjustment and higher import reduced their output. Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel, Nippon Kinzoku and Takasago Tekko managed to post slightly higher sales. The recurring profit decreased by 37.7% for Nippon Yakin Kogyo, by 32.7% for Nippon Metal Industry and 25.5% for Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel under unfavorable condition. The all 5 makers posted lower recurring profit. Nippon Metal Industry and Takasago Tekko expect higher sales and profit for fiscal 2006 while Nippon Yakin Kogyo expects lower recurring profit due to higher raw materials cost with higher sales and Nippon Kinzoku expects lower sales and profit. Nippon Metal Industry, which posted higher net profit due to sales of fixed asset, and Nippon Kinzoku, which posted record net profit after shuffle of production sites, increase the dividend for fiscal 2005. Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel increased the sales by 0.6% to 245.548 billion yen for fiscal 2005 from fiscal 2004 due to 29,000 yen per tonne of higher averaged selling price though the shipment decreased by 11.3% to 990,000 tonnes. Nippon Kinzoku posted higher sales with higher selling price and higher sales for strategic products. Takasago Tekko also posted higher sales due to higher sales for automotive products including cold rolled strip and rim despite of the lower stainless sales. Nippon Yakin Kogyo’s consolidated sales decreased by 6.6% to 112.413 billion yen including Yakin Kawasaki and Yakin Oheyama for fiscal 2005 from fiscal 2004 due to lower sales for high performance products including shadow mask along with stainless steel. Nippon Metal Industry also reduced the sales for stainless, heat resistance steel and processed products. They posted lower recurring profit due to lower sales volume and higher raw materials cost despite of higher selling price in fiscal 2005 from fiscal 2004. Nippon Steel & Sumikin Stainless Steel posted 24.4% lower recurring profit with US$ 0.4 per pound higher nickel price. Nippon Yakin Kogyo also reported 4.9 billion yen of negative impact from lower sales of high performance products and 10.4 billion yen higher raw materials cost.