Australia's construction giant Leighton Holdings reaffirms full year profit target

Leighton Holdings, the largest project development and contracting company in Australia, said on Friday that the company expected a full year profit of up to 650 million AU dollars (658.91 million U.S. dollars) after its first quarter growth. At Leighton Holdings' annual general meeting in Sydney on Friday, Chairman of Leighton Holdings, Stephen Johns, reported a 30 percent rise in total revenue in the three months to September 30, to 6.2 billion AU dollars (6.28 billion U.S. dollars). Unaudited profit after tax for the September quarter was 137 million AU dollars (138.88 U.S. dollars), up from 48 million AU dollars (48.66 million U.S. dollars) in the same period in 2010. The profit did not include the capital gain on Leighton's sale of the HWE mining iron ore business, Johns said. "In addition, we expect to report a profit of between 600 and 650 million AU dollars (608 and 659 million U.S. dollars) for the 12 months to 30 June, 2012," Johns said. "For the full six-month period to 31 December 2011, the company expects to report an operating profit after tax of around 250 million AU dollars (253.43 million U.S. dollars)," he said.