Japan's Sharp forecasts $3.8 billion loss

TOKYO: Japanese electronics maker Sharp said Wednesday it expected a full-year net loss of $3.8 billion, blaming falling prices, a high yen and the global economic slowdown.

The firm expects a net loss of 290 billion yen for the year to March, reversing an earlier projection of a six billion yen net profit.

For the nine months to December it made a net loss of 213.5 billion yen, compared with a 21.83 billion yen profit in the corresponding period in the previous year, it said.

During the same period, operating loss came to 9.1 billion yen, reversing operating profit of 66.5 billion yen in the previous year, while sales fell 18.3 percent to 1.9 trillion yen, Sharp said.

"Major price falls of products and devices such as LCD colour televisions and solar batteries as well as a dramatic increase of the yen" resulted in the lower revenues, the company said in a statement.

Sharp booked an extraordinary item of 80.9 billion yen for structural reforms and losses related to the suspension of a large LCD plant in Japan after the devastating earthquake and tsunami in March.

It also booked corporate tax and other expenses of 115.2 billion yen after revaluing deferred tax assets on its books.

For the year to March, the company expects only to break even at the operating level, compared with an earlier forecast of 85 billion yen in profit.

It lowered its sales estimate by 8.9 percent to 2.55 trillion yen from 2.80 trillion yen.