India’s largest car maker Maruti Suzuki has reported 9.19% decline in sales during August, this year at 59,908 units as against 65,968 units in the same month last year.

In a statement released today, the company said that its domestic sales stood at 54,113 units compared to 60,229 units in the same month a year-ago, which indicates a fall of 10.15%.

However, company’s exports grew marginally at 5,795 units as against 5,739 units in the same period, last fiscal.

The A2 segment comprising Alto, Zen Estilo, Swift and WagonR registered a decline of 9.75%. The sales stood at 37,667 units as against 41,736 units for the corresponding period of last year.

Vienna  - The Vienna Insurance Group reported a profit increase of 29.3 per cent for the first half of 2008 on Thursday, boosted by strong growth in Central and Eastern European countries, where the group is market leader.

Net profits after minorities rose to 207.74 million euros (306.38 million dollars), compared with 160.63 million euros in the first six months of last year.

Second-quarter net profits were up 37.4 per cent, to 116.33 million euros, the company said.

In the first half of this year, revenue in terms of premiums written rose 20.7 per cent to 4.22 billion euros.

Berlin - German investor confidence rebounded in August, a key indicator released Tuesday showed, despite concerns about the outlook for Europe's biggest economy and volatile financial markets.

Drawn up by the Mannheim-based Centre for European Economic Research, the ZEW index for this month posted a surprise 8.4-points increase to 55.5 points.

Analysts had predicted that the index would fall to minus 62 points in August. The ZEW July index dropped by 11.5 points to minus 63.9 points in July.

Oslo - Turnover and profits increased in second-quarter 2008, shipbuilding group Aker Yards said Friday attributing the development to increased activity at its yards.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) totalled 72 million kroner (13.8 million dollars). In the corresponding business period of 2007 the group posted a loss of 162 million kroner.

Turnover for continuing operations was 7.92 billion kroner, up 31 per cent on the corresponding business period 2007.

Taipei

Vienna - Raiffeisen International, the Austrian banking group operating in Central and Eastern Europe, raised its second-quarter profit by 49 per cent, as income from interest grew by 37 per cent, the company reported Thursday.

Setting a new quarterly record, net income climbed to 311.3 million euros (481.3 million dollars), from 208.8 million euros in the same period last year.

Net interest income rose to 786.5 million euros, up from 573.8 million euros a year earlier.

In the first half of 2008, Raiffeisen posted a net profit of 565.7 million euros, an increase of 41 per cent compared to 2007.