China's Yuhe Q1 net income edges up

Net income for Chinese poultry company, Yuhe International edged up less than 1%, as higher sales volume was partly offset by lower selling prices and higher feed costs.

Quarterly net income was US$2.93 million, or 18 cents per share, compared with US$2.91 million, or 19 cents per share, last year. Revenue rose 8% to US$11.8 million from US$10.9 million last year, while sales volume rose 11% to 25.6 million birds.

"While the first quarter is traditionally one of our slowest in terms of sales due to the cold weather and the Chinese Spring Festival, we saw an uptick in sales volume of our day old broilers," CEO Zhentao Gao, said in a statement.

He added that gross margin - which fell to 33.2% from 37.2% - was hurt by lower selling prices and higher feed costs. Results are expected to improve by the second half of the year, he said.