KUALA LUMPUR: Perusahaan Sadur Timah Malaysia Bhd’s (Perstima) net profit surged to RM20.67 million in its third quarter (3Q) ended Dec 31, 2009 from RM1.22 million a year earlier. This was attributed to the timing difference between the selling price and the raw material price changes coupled with positive contribution from a subsidiary.

Revenue fell 25% to RM210.91 million from RM281.31 million while basic earnings per share (EPS) jumped to 20.82 sen from 1.23 sen previously.

For the nine months to Dec 31, 2009, net profit rose 167% to RM50.97 million from RM19.06 million in the same period the year earlier, though revenue fell 18.5% to RM609.16 million from RM747.52, while EPS rose to 51.33 sen from 19.2 sen.

Perstima said its board expected the operating environment to remain challenging and competitive but added it was confident it could achieve better performance for the financial year ending March 31, 2010 mainly due to higher contribution of its subsidiary.