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.

Tokyo - Nissan Motor Co said Friday that its net profit fell 42.8 per cent to 52.8 billion yen (505 million dollars) in its first quarter from the same quarter a year before, mainly because of the rise in the yen.

Operating profit also plunged 46.1 per cent in the April-to-June quarter to 79.9 billion yen.

Japan's third-largest automaker saw its sales fall 4.1 per cent to 2.35 trillion yen.

Nissan's global sales were up 6.9 per cent for the quarter to 936,000 units.