Huhtamaki Cuts 1994 Forecast

Finnish group Huhtamaki has lowered its forecast for the full year following flat profits and a decline in earnings per share in the first eight months of 1994. Sales are reduced by 500 million markka ($103.7 million) to 8.5 billion markka ($1.8 billion). It is expected that EPS will be lower than the 133.59 markka achieved last year. Pretax profits will be flat at around 506 million markka.

The company is blaming a 15% rise in the markka against the US dollar for the changes. Huhtamaki's chief executive, Timo Peltola, is cautiously optimistic about an improvement in key markets, and results from its pharmaceutical unit Leiras were said to be satisfactory, according to the Financial Times.