YOKOHAMA, Japan (Reuters) - Nissan Motor Co <7201.T> beat analyst estimates by posting a 56.8 percent rise in quarterly net profit on Monday, helped by a weaker yen and improving sales in China, its biggest market.
Japan's second-biggest automaker by global sales volume after Toyota Motor Corp <7203.T> booked 84.3 billion yen ($824.73 million) profit for October-December, compared with the mean estimate of 57.1 billion yen in a Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S poll of seven analysts.
Nissan kept its profit outlook for the full year to March-end at 355 billion yen compared with analysts' 364.2 billion yen estimate. The maker of Infiniti and Datsun brands cut its outlook three months ago by nearly 20 percent.
Nissan's operating profit margin for the nine months to December was 4.1 percent compared with 9.7 percent at Toyota and 6.6 percent at Honda Motor Co <7267.T>.
Nissan aims to boost its operating profit margin as well as global market share to 8 percent each by the year ending March 2017. Recent hurdles include product recalls and sales slowdown in markets such as Thailand and Russia.
Shares of Nissan closed up 0.1 percent before the earnings release compared with a 1.8 percent rise in the benchmark index
<.N225>. ($1 = 102.2150 Japanese yen)
(Reporting by Yoko Kubota; Editing by Christopher Cushing)
