Hyundai Motor's Q1 profit drops 2.4%, beats forecasts

South Korea's Hyundai Motor Co reported on Thursday a drop of 2.4 per cent in first-quarter profit, beating analysts forecasts, helped by solid sales of high-margin cars, while a cheaper domestic currency boosted repatriated earnings.

The world's No.3 automaker by sales along with affiliate Kia Corp reported net profit of 3.2 trillion won ($2.32 billion) for the January-March period, down from 3.3 trillion won a year earlier.

That compared with an average forecast of three trillion won by LSEG SmartEstimate.

Revenue rose 7.6 per cent to 41 trillion won.

"The first-quarter sales dropped on year due to temporary shutdown of our Asan production line preparing for launch of new vehicles, but we saw solid sales growth in major markets like North America and India," Hyundai Motor said in a statement.

Shares in Hyundai Motor were trading down 0.8 per cent, versus benchmark KOSPI's 1.3 per cent fall as of 0505 GMT.

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