Sharp swings to first quarterly profit in two years, helped by weak yen

Japan's Sharp Corp reported its first quarterly net profit in two years, beating estimates, as the weaker yen and revived demand for solar cells and display panels boosted the consumer electronics maker's turnaround drive. Sharp, a supplier of panels for Apple Inc's iPhone, said on Thursday it made a net profit of 13.6 billion yen ($139 million) in its fiscal second quarter, its first since the three months ended September 2011. That easily beat an expected net loss of 9 billion yen, according to Thomson Reuters' Starmine SmartEstimate, the average of the most accurate analysts' estimates. A year earlier, in the trough of a depression brought on by strong competition from foreign rivals and pressure on its overseas revenues from a strong yen, Sharp made a net loss of 249.2 billion yen.

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