Revenue was boosted by domestic sales which rose 37.4% yr/yr to HUF 4.59 billion in Q2 while export sales fell a slight 0.8% to HUF 5.23 billion. Q1 EBITDA was up 28.9% at HUF 1.03 billion.

Operating profits rose sharply from a mere HUF 14m in Q2 2009 to HUF 454m in Q2 this year but the group recorded HUF 1.78 billion financial losses in the quarter this year as against HUF 10.31 billion financial profits a year earlier.

Q2 net losses, of HUF 1.37 billion, compare to net profit of HUF 8.01 billion posted in Q2 2009.

H1 saw less revenue and shrinking losses as consolidated revenue fell 3.1% to HUF 17.72 billion, mainly reflecting a lower exchange rate and . H1 net losses narrowed to HUF 967m from HUF 2.36 billion a year earlier as financial losses dropped from HUF 2.48 billion to HUF 1.12 billion.

H1 gross profit fell slightly but the profit margin improved 0.5 percentage points as cost savings and efficiency improvement more than improved the adverse effect of the exchange rates.

Operating profits still shrank, to HUF 411m from HUF 551m in H1, and this, coupled with less amortization, caused a 24.2% drop of H1 EBITDA to HUF 1.58 billion.

Rába had total assets of HUF 33.77 billion on June 30, 2010, 4.1% more than six months earlier. Net debt stood at HUF 9.3 billion at the end of June, falling HUF 2.9 billion from December and dropping HUF 0.4 billion from March. Besides the usual operation cashflow, the sale of a stake in a joint venture contributed to the drop, the report said. (MTI-ECONEWS)