Volkswagen: nine-month operating profit beats forecast

(CercleFinance.com) - Volkswagen beat forecasts with an 11% rise in its nine-month operating profit to 14.
8 billion euros, thanks to improvements in the carmaker's mix and price positioning.

These improvements offset lower sales of Volkswagen passenger cars, which remained flat at 2.8 million vehicles in the first nine months of the year, the group said.

Between January and September, sales grew by 6.9% year-on-year to 186.6 billion euros.

Pre-tax profit rose by 16.9% to 14.6 billion euros.

This "good performance" amid a "challenging market environment", makes VW optimistic that it will achieve its full-year targets for 2019, the group said.

The only setback is that Volkswagen now expects deliveries to customers in 2019 to be similar to their level last year. Until now, a slight increase had been expected.

Shares in Europe's largest carmaker were up 1% at 173.3 euros in mid-morning trading, easily outperforming the European auto index which was down 0.2%.

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