The sales revenue increased by 5.8%, with the core operating income up 34.8% and the operating profit up 43.9% in comparison with the previous term, and the profit for the term attributable to the parent company owners increased by 44,9%. The term-end dividend is 24 yen with an increase of 4 yen and a planned dividend for the full year is 44 yen with an increase of 6 yen.

As described later, there was a sluggish performance in sales of each segment like air separation gas and specialty gas, but in terms of profit throughout the year the company there was a great increase thanks to the well-permeated price revision of gas in each region, mitigating hike in the electricity fare and also the yen depreciation.

By regional segment, the Japan segment attained an increase in revenue thanks to the effect of price management with the background of cost hiking although there was a negative trend in the delivery of air-separation gas, LP gas and specialty gases of major products. In the business fields related to equipment and construction there was also an increase in revenue with the sales brought from the process of the medium and large-scaled constructions. However, the total sales decreased by 1.4% while operating profit increase 35,7% because of the influences of the unconsolidated of LP gas distributors for households which the company implemented in the fourth quarter term on the other hand.

In the USA segment like the case of Japan, the minus factor in the sales of air-separation gases was made up for by the price revision. As the sales of hardware for welding and cutting increased and the business of electronics-related equipment was so good that total sales revenue in total turned out to increase by 14.5% with the profit of the segment up 34.9%.

In the European segment, the package gas business was rather good but the on-site gas business for steelmakers was sluggish. In terms of profit, along with the stabilized trend of the electricity cost which had been affected by the world situation, the gas producing cost has been in an improving trend. On the whole, it has attained a great growth in terms of profit with the increased segment profit by 52.6% for the revenue increase by 10.8% only.
　
In the Asian and Oceanian segment, there occurred a great setback due to customer’s output adjustment and postponement of capital investment especially in the businesses (specialty gas and related equipment sales) for the electronics industries of key category in the area.　
In addition, there were more negative factors like the decreased delivery of bulk gases and the stall of LP gas business in Australia. Therefore, the total sales revenue increased modestly by 0.2% with the segmental profit stayed at just a limited increase by 3.1% though there was some positive factor of price revision.

As for the forecast of this full year, the company anticipates increase in sales revenue by 3.6% amounting to 1.3 trillion yen with a core operating income up 6.6% amounting to 177 billion yen and an operating income up 2.9% amounting to 177 billion yen. The profit for the term attributable to the parent company owners is forecasted to decrease by 0.9% amounting to 105 billion yen.