South Korea’s steel giant Posco has had a handful of favorable factors – sizzling demand, spike in product prices, and foreign exchange rate – to fuel quarterly best of near $3 billion in income and $18 billion in revenue in July-September period.

In its regulatory filing on Monday, the steelmaker reported that it raked in 3.12 trillion won ($2.66 billion) in operating income on a consolidated basis for the third quarter, matching its guidance released earlier this month. The operating profit rose 41.82 percent from three months ago and 365.67 percent from a year ago.

It is the company’s best-ever quarterly result since it started publishing earnings in a regulatory filing in 2006 and the first time to surpass the 3-trillion won mark after breaching 2 trillion won in the second quarter.

Net income came to 2.63 trillion won up 45.3 percent on quarter and 415.69 percent on year. Sales expanded 12.85 percent from the second quarter and 44.74 percent from a year earlier to 20.64 trillion won, crossing the 20 trillion-won mark for the first time.

Posco shares finished Monday up 3.13 percent at 313,000 won in Seoul.

The company performed well across the board from steel and energy to new materials, Posco said.

Its strong performance was mainly led by its mainstay steel business that saw a surge in sales thanks to recovery in global steel demand on top of reduced supply from China amid nationwide power crunch. Posco also has hiked the price of its steel plates for shipbuilding, which has helped bolster its profitability.

Non-steel sector also fared well.

Its trading arm Posco International delivered an operating profit of 148.5 billion won, expanding 39 percent on year with sales hitting a quarterly high of 9.15 trillion won, up 81 percent on year.

Posco Chemical, a secondary battery material manufacturing unit, generated an operating profit of 31.5 billion won over sales of 505.5 billion won, up 62.4% and 29.9 percent, respectively, on year thanks to solid growth of the cathode materials business.

Posco’s separate sales and operating profit for the three months reached 11.3 trillion won and 2.3 trillion won, respectively, surging 71.88 percent and 784.62 percent from a year earlier.

By Lee Soo-min

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