Tokyo—The Yokohama Rubber Co., Ltd., announced today that it has raised its projections for consolidated net sales and earnings in the first half of the present fiscal year. Those projections are for the six-month period from April 1 to September 30, 2010, the first half of the fiscal year to March 31, 2011. They update projections announced by Yokohama on July 30, 2010, when the company released its business and financial results for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2010. The improved outlook for earnings reflects accelerated progress in trimming costs, as well as the increased sales forecast.

Yokohama now projects that its net loss of 3.9 billion yen in the first half of the previous fiscal year will shrink to approximately zero. Management expects the company to post operating income of 6.3 billion yen, compared with an operating loss of.4 billion yen in the first half of the previous fiscal year. Yokohama's projections call for net sales to increase 18.3% over the same period of the previous fiscal year, to 239.0 billion yen. The projection for net income is a 1.4 billion yen improvement over the projection announced on July 30, 2010. Yokohama has raised the projection for operating income 57.5% and the projection for net sales 0.4%. The company will announce its full-year fiscal projections on November 1, 2010, when it will release its interim business and financial results.