Nissan sees sharp fall in profits

By Chang-Ran Kim, Asia auto correspondent

TOKYO (Reuters) - Nissan reported a 14 percent drop in fourth-quarter operating profit, and forecast a sharp fall in annual profits this year due to a weaker dollar, rising commodity prices and sinking U.S. demand.

Japan's No.3 automaker, controlled by France's Renault, joins bigger domestic rivals Toyota and Honda in flagging a tough year ahead.

While ramping up sales in China, Russia and some other emerging markets, it is being hit hard in the United States, its biggest market, where demand for its ageing Titan pickup trucks and other bigger vehicles has slumped as consumers flock to smaller, more fuel-efficient cars at a time of record fuel prices.

Sales of its Versa subcompact and Rogue crossover cars are doing well, but not enough to prop up profitability in the traditionally lucrative U.S. market.

January-March operating profit was 211.8 billion yen (1.05 billion pounds), slightly ahead of an average estimate of 204.8 billion yen in a Reuters Estimates poll of 20 brokerages.

That put its full-year operating profit at 790.8 billion yen, short of management's plan for 800 billion yen.

Fourth-quarter net profit rose 67.5 percent to 137.6 billion yen, while revenue fell 16.8 percent to 2.99 trillion yen.

For the year to end-March 2009, Nissan forecast operating profit to fall 30 percent to 550 billion yen, compared with analysts' consensus expectations ahead of the results for an annual operating profit of 652 billion yen.