French La Poste to announce good results
La Poste, the French public postal services group, is expected to announce satisfactory results for 2003, despite the industrial action in the spring of the year. The group will reportedly post a group net profit of 202m euros, compared with 34m in 2002.
Turnover went up by 4 per cent in the period, to 18.004bn, but fell short of the group’s 18.25bn target. The courier division generated about half of this result. Operating profit increased threefold, reaching 310m compared with 100m in 2002, mainly due to cost-cutting. The group’s employees are still concerned about its financial performance, and the CFDT union has called for strikes in financial centres on April 27 in a protest about planned job cuts.
