After posting losses for three consecutive quarters, the global steel giant, ArcelorMittal, on Wednesday posted a net income of $900 million for the quarter ended September 30.
The firm's net income of the company in the third quarter of this fiscal was, however, 76 per cent lower from the year-ago period.
The company had a net income of $3.8 billion in the year-ago period, after which it posted three consecutive quarterly losses amid demand slump. "As anticipated, we have seen the first signs of recovery in the third quarter," ArcelorMittal chairman and CEO L N Mittal said in a statement.
Maintaining that the "operating environment still remains challenging," the company said it is hopeful of a gradual improvement in steel demand in 2010.
"...We should continue to see further gradual improvement through 2010, although the operating environment remains challenging," Mittal said.
Amid the slump in demand during the economic crisis, the company had reduced the production capacity of its mills to almost half.
However, with the signs of recovery the company had restarted some of its facilities, taking the firm's capacity utilisation to 61 per cent in the last quarter. The steel major now expects the capacity utilisation to go up to 70 per cent in the next three-month period.
