South Korea-based Hyundai Steel has announced that in the first quarter of this year it increased its total sales by 75.8 percent year on year to KRW 3.55 trillion ($3.31 billion), its highest-ever quarterly sales revenue. In the given quarter, the company's net profit amounted to KRW 258.3 billion ($241 million), rising by 9.6 percent year on year and down by 16.1 percent over the last quarter of 2010.
Hyundai Steel said that the main reasons for the strong Q1 results were the increased sales of flat products such as hot rolled coil and heavy plate based on the early stabilization of operations of blast furnace no. 2, as well as successful cost reduction efforts.
In addition, Hyundai Steel's sales volume of flat products, for the first time, exceeded its long product sales. Accordingly, in the January-March period of this year Hyundai Steel sold 2,053,000 mt of flat products, which accounted for 53 percent of the company's total sales, and sold 1,819,000 mt of long products and heavy machinery.