Japan 5 Major Rolled Copper Makers Post Better Results in April-June

Japanese major 5 rolled copper makers posted higher consolidated operating profit for April-June from same period of 2009 by Tuesday thanks to demand recovery for digital appliances, semiconductor and automobile. Two of them revised the full year outlook upward for the year ending March 2011.

Furukawa Electric’s metals unit posted 962 million yen of operating profit for April-June compared with 3.7 billion yen of loss in same period of 2009. The firm enjoyed higher demand for copper strip for digital appliances and automobile and electrolytic copper foil for lithium ion battery and printed circuit. The copper tube business turned into profitable with recovering air conditioner demand.

Dowa Holdings’ metal processing unit posted 7.5 times of operating profit in April-June compared with same period of 2009 thanks to strong demand for alloyed copper strip and plating strip.

Japanese largest brass bar maker of San-Etsu Metals posted 1.109 billion yen of operating profit. The firm managed to increase the output under tight supply of scrap increasing the sales of brass bar and wire by 55% to 20,127 tonnes from same period of 2009.

KITZ Corporation posted 27.8% higher operating profit in April-June from same period of 2009 due to higher operation rate. Nippon Shindo posted 363 million yen of operating profit thanks to higher sales for brass bar and wire and connector wire.

Furukawa Electric and Dowa Holdings revised the full year outlook for rolled copper related units. Furukawa Electric expects the electrolytic copper foil output will increase by 5% in the first half and by 10% in the second half compared with first half of fiscal 2008 while the copper strip output in fiscal 2010 is around 80% of first half of fiscal 2008.