Top Internet portal Yahoo Japan Corp. said Monday it set new highs in both group net profit and operating revenue in the first half of fiscal 2006, reflecting continuously increasing use of the Internet, especially broadband services.
In its consolidated earnings report for the April-September half, Yahoo Japan posted a net profit of 26.81 billion yen, up 25 percent over a year earlier, on a 25.6 percent increase in revenues to 100.47 billion yen.
Yahoo Japan, which is 41.3 percent owned by Softbank Corp. in terms of voting rights and 33.5 percent by Yahoo Inc. of the U.S., also reported a pretax profit of 47.71 billion yen, up 31.2 percent.
Net profit per share fell to 443.41 yen from 1,390.20 yen as a result of a 2-for-1 stock split carried out at the beginning of the fiscal year.
Yahoo Japan's advertising revenue rose 43 percent to 42.54 billion yen, accounting for 42.3 percent of total operating revenue. The segment chalked up operating profit of 23.45 billion yen, up 42.8 percent.
The company declined to release earnings projections for the entire fiscal year to March 31, citing a rapidly changing business environment surrounding the Internet.
But it forecast a net profit of 13.65 billion yen to 15.20 billion yen for the October-December quarter and a pretax profit of 24.00 billion yen to 26.50 billion yen on revenue of 51.70 billion yen to 55.20 billion yen.
In fiscal 2005, Yahoo Japan booked a net profit of 47.09 billion yen, an all-time high.