Nippon Yusen K.K., the nation's biggest shipping firm, said Thursday its group net profit slid 49.7 percent in the fiscal first half to Sept. 30 from a year earlier to 7.79 billion yen.

The drop was attributed mainly to one-off losses of 12.53 billion yen.

These included 3.86 billion yen in capital losses from the sale of property assets and 2.39 billion yen in appraisal losses on real estate assets held for investment purposes.

Net profit per share shrank to 6.34 yen from 12.54 yen a year earlier.

Group pretax profit rose 2.2 percent to 30.53 billion yen, mainly because of cost cutting, on a 5 percent rise in group operating revenues to 614.61 billion yen.

For the full year to March 31, Nippon Yusen left unchanged its group earnings projections of a net profit of 14 billion yen and a pretax profit of 46 billion yen on operating revenues of 1.194 trillion yen.

Kawasaki profit down

Major shipping company Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha Ltd. said Thursday its group net profit in the fiscal first half to Sept. 30 fell 34.7 percent to 4.92 billion yen, as flagging shipping fees dented its profitability.

Group pretax profit fell 33.9 percent to 7.84 billion yen on operating revenues of 309.59 billion yen, up 4 percent.

Per-share net profit for the period dropped to 8.29 yen, down from 12.68 yen a year earlier.

The company said it will skip a midterm dividend payment as it did a year ago. But it will pay a yearend dividend of 4 yen per share for the year to next March, up 1 yen from the previous year.

For the full year, it forecast a group net profit of 10 billion yen, up from 4.77 billion yen in the previous year, and a pretax profit of 16.5 billion yen, up from 11.97 billion yen, on projected operating revenues of 610 billion yen, up from 571.01 billion yen.