Japan Major Nonferrous Smelters Post Mixed Quarter Results

Japanese major nonferrous metals smelters reported mixed results in April-June. JX Nippon Mining & Metals announced on Friday the firm posted 8% higher recurring profit at 18.9 billion yen than same period of 2010 level due to higher metal prices. Sumitomo Metal Mining reported on the day 26% higher recurring profit at 37.6 billion yen. Mitsui Mining & Smelting posted higher operating profit and Furukawa posted recurring loss.

JX Nippon Mining & Metals posted better results in April-June from same period of 2010 thanks to higher copper price despite of the higher yen rate. The copper resource development unit posted 2% higher profit and the copper smelting unit posted 19% higher profit.

Sumitomo Metal Mining posted 4% lower operating profit at 28.1 billion yen for April-June from same period of 2010 partly due to inventory valuation loss from nickel. The firm posted higher recurring profit thanks to higher equity method profit and lower loss from foreign exchange.

Mitsui Mining & Smelting posted 11% higher operating profit at 7.8 billion yen for April-June from same period of 2010 due to higher metal price. The firm posted 17.2% lower recurring profit at 7.4 billion yen. Furukawa posted wider recurring loss at 87 million yen compared with 20 million yen of loss in same period of 2010 due to the earthquake influence while the firm expects 62.4% higher recurring profit at 2 billion yen for the year ending March 2012 from fiscal 2010.