Nissan Motor Co. said Thursday that its group operating profit for the first half of 2006 fell 15.3 percent year-on-year to 348.6 billion yen, mainly due to falling car sales in Japan and the United States and rising raw materials costs.
But Nissan President Carlos Ghosn stressed that the nation's second-largest automaker will make a strong recovery for the full year to March with the launch of nine new international models in the second half.
Nissan has launched only one new model in the April-September period.