Nissan predicts return

Press, 30 May 1987, Page 25

Nissan predicts return

NZPA-Reuter Tokyo Nissan, Japan’s second largest car manufacturer, has predicted a slight comeback in fiscal 1987 after posting its first operating loss last year. Senior managing director, Atsushi Muramatsu, told reporters the company expected net profit of 50 billion yen in the year ending March 31, I 1988, up 7.3 per cent on

the previous year. This assumed an exchange rate of 140 yen to the U.S. dollar. Mr Muramatsu forecast that Nissan, the world’s fifth largest car manufacturer by sales, would have sales up 2 per cent to about 3500 billion yen. Nissan posted its first loss, 8.45 billion yen in the year which ended on March 31, compared with 89 billion yen profit the

yearbefore. The loss was attributed to the yen’s steep climb against the dollar, which made Japanese goods more expensive and less attractive to overseas customers. The company suffered foreign exchange losses of 220 billion yen in 1986, when the dollar nosedived to an average of 159 yen against an average 221 yen a year earlier.