Currency Exchange Affects 1996 Sales At Astra

Sales for 1996 at Astra of Sweden amounted to just under 39 billionSwedish kroner ($5.26 billion), an increase of 9%. The company noted that calculated at constant exchange rates, sales growth for the year was 17%. Net price changes did not impact sales growth during the year, the firm said.

Pretax earnings of 13.22 billion kroner grew 10% in 1996, and earnings per share, at 15.33 kroner, were up 8%. At constant exchange rates pretax profits were ahead 17%. The firm's operating earnings were 12.22 billion kroner, an increase of 10% on the previous year. Net profits were just over 1 billion kroner, compared to 950 million kroner a year earlier. Financial exchange rate differences totalled 32 million kroner.

Astra's pretax profits and EPS came in ahead of Goldman Sachs analysts Mark Tracey and John Murphy's expectations, which were pretax profits of 12.65 billion kroner and EPS of 14.70 kroner.