South Korea’s largest steelmaker Posco posted 979.1 billion won ($868.9 million) in operating income in the second quarter this year, beating market expectation on brisk sales of its non-steel operations.

Posco said in a regulatory filing on Thursday said that consolidated operating profit for the second quarter ended June 30 this year jumped 44.3 percent on year to 979.1 billion won.

The result was higher than the market consensus of 944.1 billion won.

Sales rose 16.2 percent on year to 14.94 trillion won and net profit jumped 140.3 percent to 530.1 billion won during the same period.

The brisk performance was led by improvement in non-steel operations including construction and energy units. Also, the portion of high value-added products against overall sales jumped 10.7 percentage points on year to reach record-high of 56 percent.

Debt ratio on a consolidated basis came down to 69.9 percent, the lowest since 2010.

The steel maker revised up its consolidated sales forecast for full 2017 by 4.5 trillion won to 59.3 trillion won from its earlier estimates in the beginning of this year.

Posco shares closed Thursday at 327,000 won, up 9,500 won or 2.99 percent from the previous session.

By Moon Ji-woong

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