Daewoo Motor Made First Profit in 34 Months

Daewoo Motor, swamped with deficit for three years, turned a surplus for the first time last month.

Daewoo Motor Chairman Lee Jong-Dae said yesterday that ``Daewoo Motor recorded a surplus after paying wages and the cost of components. The operating profit turned a surplus in the two years and 10 months since June 1998, making a monthly operating profit of 6.7 billion won in April``.

Chairman Lee explicated that what made the operating profit possible was the recovery in domestic car sales and a successful restructuring via accomplishing over 75 percent of self-help plan (999.2 billion won) of this year. Daewoo Motor is planning to get a financial supports from creditors until June this year, and to launch the independent management without extra supports from the second half of this year.

In the first quarter of this year, Daewoo Motor`s operating losses was 45.0 billion won, and total car sales decreased 20 percent over the same period of last year, 760.6 billion won. But net profit was estimated for 6.8 billion won, increase of 18 percent.

daviskim@donga.com