Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/02/11
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]This is a multi-part message in MIME format. - --------------362D7E875EBE Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit http://www.ft.com/search97cgi/vtopic?action=view&VdkVgwKey=%2Fapache%2Fdocs%2Fhippocampus%2Fv85f4e%2Ehtm&DocOffset=1&DocsFound=4&QueryZip=%3CMany%3E%27Leica%27&Collection=Coll2&Collection=Coll4&Collection=Coll6&Collection=Coll3&SortOrder=Desc&SearchUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Eft%2Ecom%2Fsearch97cgi%2Fvtopic%3FQueryZip%3D%253CMany%253E%2527Leica%2527%26Filter%3Dftfilter%252Ehts%26ResultTemplate%3Dstndrslp%252Ehts%26QueryText%3DLeica%26action%3DSearch%26Collection%3DColl2%26Collection%3DColl4%26Collection%3DColl6%26Collection%3DColl3%26SortOrder%3DDesc%26ResultStart%3D1%26ResultCount%3D10& - --------------362D7E875EBE Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1; name="vtopic" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Disposition: inline; 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Asian turnover fell 47 per cent to DM11.2m ($6.17m)= in the third quarter of the year ending March 31 1998.<BR> <P>A disappointing Christmas period in most of Europe, especially Germany= , also dragged down sales. Total September-December turnover fell 12 per = cent to DM67m, though the figure for the first nine months showed an 11 p= er cent gain to DM193m. The shares lost DM5.80 to close at DM24.<BR> <P><font color=3D"#FF0000">Leica</font>, which came to the stock market i= n 1996, said some cameras destined for Asia had had to be diverted, putti= ng pressure on prices in the US and Europe. Its Minox division had suffer= ed from weakness in the cheaper compact camera market, though sales of it= s "spy" camera had held up.<BR> <P>The company plans to reduce capacity to curb the impact of the worseni= ng sales trend, which caused nine months' operating profits to tumble fro= m DM4.97m to only DM7,000. In the third quarter alone, <font color=3D"#FF= 0000">Leica</font> incurred an operating loss of DM3.77m against a DM5.65= m profit the previous year.<BR> <P>Minox will fail to break even for the full year, and the company will = push through a restructuring programme to lower annual fixed costs by at = least DM2m and focus on Minox's core products. 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