Hankook Tire Posts High Profits

Seoul August 6, 2004; South Korea's largest tire maker saw its net profits jump to 101.2 billion won ($88 million) for the first half of this year, up 58.4 percent from the same period last year, due to robust exports of high valuedadded tire products.

Its sales also rose 7.19 percent to 912.9 billion won for the first six months of the year with exports up 19 percent to $427 million.

Sales will continue to grow for the rest of the year because the second quarter typically records more sales than the first quarter and the tire maker has secured enough orders from the United State and Europe, the company official said.

The company expects its sales to reach a 1.78 trillion won target this year without much difficulty.