Trading house Mitsubishi Corp. said Friday that its group net profits plunged 78 percent to 5.57 billion yen in fiscal 1999, on sales of 13.109 trillion yen, down 4.2 percent.
Pretax profits for the fiscal year through March 31 rose 17.8 percent to 118.06 billion yen. Per-share net profits came to 3.55 yen, sharply down from the previous fiscal year's 16.13 yen.
Mitsubishi, which has been promoting early retirement among its employees, blamed the fall in net profit mainly on a one-time write-off of the upsurge in retirement allowances and an outlay to cover a shortfall in its reserve for paying out pension benefits to retired employees.