Hyundai Heavy Q4 profit jumps 74 pct, beats fcast

SEOUL, Jan 31 (Reuters) - Hyundai Heavy Industries Co Ltd (009540.KS), the world's top shipbuilder, on Thursday reported a bigger-than-expected 73.5 percent jump in quarterly profit, fuelled by high-value ship orders.

Hyundai earned a 513 billion won ($543.3 million) in net profit during the fourth quarter ended on Dec. 31, 2007, beating a 440.5 billion won forecast in a poll of Reuters Estimates.

That compared to a 295.7 billion won net profit a year ago and 434.7 billion won profit in the third quarter.

South Korea's shipbuilders including Hyundai are expected to perform strongly over the next two or three years as orders for expensive and lucrative vessels, which they secured since 2005, feed through to earnings.

However, concerns are growing that their outlook after that may darken as a slowdown in the global economy due to the U.S. credit crunch will hurt the shipping industry and new ship orders.

Higher raw material prices are another worry, analysts said.

Reflecting the concerns, shares in Hyundai Heavy, which has a market value of $23 billion, had fallen 35.4 percent so far this year as of Wednesday, after rising 4.6 percent in the fourth quarter, compared to a 2.5 percent fall in the broader market in the October-December quarter . ($1=944.2) (Reporting by Cheon Jong-woo; Editing by Marie-France Han and Keiron Henderson)