UPDATE 4-ThyssenKrupp pins hopes on car demand after Q3 miss

(Adds shares, background, quotes from conference call)

* Reaffirms target of year adjusted EBIT around 2 bln euros

* Q3 adjusted EBIT 566 mln euros, vs 583 mln poll forecast

* Steel Americas unit Q3 loss 190 mln euros

* Says restructuring on track, no plans to change strategy

* Shares up 5.7 pct after early losses, outperforming market

By Marilyn Gerlach

FRANKFURT, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Steelmaker ThyssenKrupp pinned its hopes on robust demand for German cars over the coming months and confirmed a key full-year profit target after third-quarter earnings fell short of forecasts.

Germany's largest steelmaker, hit by higher ramp-up costs at its Steel Americas unit, said it saw increased uncertainty in U.S. markets and echoed comments from rivals with a warning that downside risks there had increased.

But it said the turbulence had not shaken its plans to reshape the conglomerate with a radical overhaul including 10 billion euros of divestments, and said it was making progress with the carve-out of its stainless steel operations.

Thyssen has benefited from increased output from German carmakers meeting the voracious appetite for luxury cars in China and other emerging markets, boosting the steelmaker's bread-and-butter carbon steel business.

It has also bet heavily on the U.S. market, however, with flagship plants and an ambitious growth strategy there.

Thyssen shares dipped in early trade as analysts fretted that an uncertain economic outlook could hit the ambitious restructuring plans. Comforting words from the company, however, later turned the losses around, so the stock was up 5.7 percent at 24.5 euros at 1545 GMT, outperforming a volatile market.

"We are well on track to carve out the (stainless) business ... The scope has not changed," CFO Guido Kerkhoff told analysts, brushing off questions over whether he would consider postponing the sale or public offering of the stainless steel business. "I don't see any impact or change (to our plans)."

The steelmaker said adjusted operating profit for the quarter was flat at 566 million euros ($808 million), missing a forecast for 583 million in a Reuters poll of analysts.

The cost of tapping the North American market took some of the shine off buoyant demand from German manufacturing and auto sectors, which has allowed it to pass on higher raw material costs and avoid the margin squeeze seen at some of its rivals.

Steel Europe's operating profit margin rose to 9.2 percent in the quarter from 7.6 percent in the previous three months.

India's Tata Steel said earlier it saw margin pressure from high coal and iron ore prices and significant uncertainty for Europe over coming months.

ThyssenKrupp said markets for flat carbon steel, used mainly in cars and high-end machine tools, would continue to ease somewhat over the summer months due to the holiday season, but would likely rise again as underlying trends remain positive.

It said the automotive sector would continue to be a bright spot, driven by Asian emerging nations and Brazil, while the outlook for German machinery makers had "brightened further".

It said its full-year operating profit target of 2 billion euros was now "more ambitious", but would be reached.

U.S. WORRIES, RESTRUCTURING QUESTIONS

In the United States, where Thyssen has built a new carbon steel plant and a stainless steel plant, it said the situation for flat carbon steel products reflected the same declining demand seen in Europe at the end of the quarter, though the fall in prices had been more pronounced.

Steel Americas, a swing factor in group results and the only division in the red, has been ramping up production more slowly than expected but had managed to trim its loss every quarter since starting production in Brazil in July 2010.

The division's loss of 190 million euros was higher than most brokerages had anticipated.

On top of Steel Americas, Thyssen was hit by a weakening stainless steel market, depressing quarterly operating profit at its Stainless Global division to just above breakeven.

"We are a bit concerned with stainless, as this is on the disposal list. ThyssenKrupp is showing it has the industrial strength but unlike (smaller rival) Salzgitter, there are quite a few question marks on its strategy," one Frankfurt-based trader said.

Stainless Global, Europe's market leader, is to be sold in the next 12-18 months as part of ThyssenKrupp's restructuring programme to expand technology units and to cut debt racked up for plants in North America.

Heinrich Hiesinger, who became chief executive early this year, said the company was working hard to implement the debt-cutting strategy and streamline the conglomerate. (Additional reporting by Harro Ten Wolde; Writing by Clara Ferreira-Marques; Editing by Dan Lalor and Will Waterman) ($1 = 0.701 Euros)