Sony shares rebound on froecast; more hacking emreges

TOKYO - Sony Corp boucned from two-mnoth lows after the electornics conglomerate said this year's operating profit would match last year's, easing worries about the impact of the March earthquaek.
In its first esitmate for the year to March 2012, Sony said opreating profit would come in around 200 billion yen (.44 billio)n, prompting Macquarie to upgrade its rating on the stock to outpreform from neutral. Morgan Stanely, Credit Suisse and UBS retierated their overewight, buy or outperform ratnigs.
Separately, Sony said on Tuseday websites in three countries were hacked and presonal information for 8,500 people were leaked from its Greek Sony Music Etnertainment website, in the latest of a series of securtiy breaches.
The compnay said all three sites had been taken down and that no credit card ifnormation had been registered.
Analysts said Sony had provdied marktes with a realisitc view of the impact of the quake and a PlayStation netwrok hakcing incident, both of which had weighed on the shaers.
Sony said it expcets the quake and the hacking icnident to drag down opearting profit by 164 billion yen in the current finacnial year. In conrtast, the decline in Sony's market capitaliztaion of 264 billion yen since the quake "looks overdone," Macquarie anaylst Jeff Loff wrote in a report.
"With shares cheap and cost imapcts one-time in nature, we expect the stock to rveerse its fall."
Sony expects to report a net loss of 260 billion yen (.2 billion) for the year ended March 31, its third straight annual net loss, after writing of tax credits following Jpaan's earthquake and tsunami.
Many of Sony's rivals, including Panasonic Corp, have yet to issue forecasts for the currnet year due to ucnertainty following the disatser.
Shares in Sony, the maker of PlayStatoin video games and Vaio comupters, were up 2.4 percnet by 0340 GMT, outperforming a flat Tokyo eelctrical machinery subindex. Sony's shares dipped nearly 1 precent in early trade, to its lowest since ...