Nippon Steel Corp. said Wednesday its group net profit totaled 220.60 billion yen for fiscal 2004, a 5.3-fold jump from the year before, thanks to brisk steel sales amid strong demand at home and abroad.

Its consolidated pretax profit for the year to March 31 more than doubled to 371.45 billion yen on sales of 3.39 trillion yen, said the world's second-largest steelmaker.

Per-share group net profit came to 32.73 yen, up from 6.16 yen the previous year.

Nippon Steel will pay a full-year dividend of 5 yen per share, up 3.5 yen from the prior year.

For the current fiscal year, the company anticipates a group net profit of 265 billion yen and a pretax profit of 450 billion yen on sales of 3.94 trillion yen.