Hyundai Hysco H1 net rises 56 pct

SEOUL, Aug. 9 (Yonhap) -- Hyundai Hysco Co., a South Korean steelmaker, said Tuesday that its first-half earnings jumped 56 percent from a year earlier on increased prices and solid demand.
Net profit reached 137 billion won (US$126 million) in the first half, compared with a profit of 88 billion won a year earlier, the company said in a regulatory filing.
Operating income surged 31 percent to 187 billion won over the cited period, and sales soared 23 percent to 3.33 trillion won, it said.
Hyundai Hysco, a unit of Hyundai Motor Group, is set to start building a cold-rolled steelmaking plant with an annual capacity of 1.5 million tons in the country next month.
Once work on this plant in completed in May 2015, the steelmaker will have an annual capacity of 6 million tons of cold-rolled steel products.
Hyundai Steel Co., the automaking group's other steelmaking affiliate, provides crude steel and hot-rolled plates to Hyundai Hysco, which then makes specialized cold-rolled plates for the country's top two automakers, Hyundai Motor Co. and Kia Motors Corp.
sam@yna.co.kr