Japan's second-biggest car maker Nissan today said it expected annual net profit to fall 15% to 270 billion yen after production disruption following the March disasters.
Nissan said that despite lower profits it expected global sales to rise 9.9% in the year to 4.6 million units, with production returning to full levels in October after being hit by supply shortages in the aftermath of the devastating quake.
'The unrelenting work ethic of Nissan employees is an inspiration - particularly after one of the worst natural disasters in modern history,' Nissan President and CEO Carlos Ghosn said in a statement.
The 9.0-magnitude March 11 earthquake and tsunami that followed destroyed entire towns, left 23,000 dead or missing and crippled electricity-generating facilities, including a nuclear power plant at the centre of an ongoing atomic emergency.
Japanese firms were hit hard by power and parts supply shortages, with the likes of Nissan, Toyota and Honda slowing production and shuttering plants amid a shortage of crucial components.
Nissan's forecast for the year ending March 2012 follows last year's annual net profit of 319.2 billion yen ($3.9 billion) in the year in which it began selling its all-electric Leaf car in Japan, the US and some parts of Europe.
Nissan said it expected an operating profit of 460 billion yen, down from last year's 537 billion yen.
