7 May 1998: Optical glass producer, Hoya Corp. of Japan, said recently its recurring profit in the latest business year to March dropped 23.6% from the previous year to 15,251 million yen.
Annual sal…
7 May 1998: Optical glass producer, Hoya Corp. of Japan, said recently its recurring profit in the latest business year to March dropped 23.6% from the previous year to 15,251 million yen. Annual sales of the major optical glass maker came to 120,027 million yen, down 7.5%. After-tax profit totalled 9,178 million yen, up 4.0%. Despite recurring profit and sales declines, the company said it plans to increase its annual dividend payment to 28 yen per share, up from the previous year“s 23 yen, in an effort to pass on profits to shareholders, company officials said. On a consolidated basis, Hoya“s recurring profit plunged 23% to 24.2 billion yen, hit by a rise in depreciation expenses. Hoya group sales amounted to 193.5 billion yen, almost unchanged from the previous term“s 193.4 billion yen. Consolidated after-tax profit fell 19.3 pct to 12,348 million yen due mainly to foreign exchange losses, said the company. Hoya and its group will start compiling quarterly business results from the current business year starting this month. The earning estimates for the April-September first half will be released late July, along with the earnings results for the April-June first quarter. The estimates for the whole year will be announced in late January, together with the results for the October-December quarter, the officials said. The company“s capital investment in the year to March 1999 is expected to total 10 billion yen, compared with 19.5 billion yen in the latest year, they said.