Poste Italiane Reduces First Half 2001 Loss

The Italian post office saw its net loss cut by 72 percent to 44 million euros in the first half of 2001, the post office said in a statement on Wednesday. The post office’s net operating result before extraordinary items for the same period moved into the black for the first time to 115 million euros. Poste Italiane has said it aims to break even by 2002. Revenue for the first half of 2001 stood at 3.6 billion euros, up 5.7 percent on the first half of 2000. Poste Italiane said its new parcel products, Paccocelere 1 and Paccocelere 3, which were launched in June, had reached a 95 percent rate of on-time delivery.