Japan's Fast Retailing forecasts profit slide

The operator of Japan's cheap-chic clothing chain Uniqlo on Friday booked a higher annual net profit in the year to August but forecast it to slide 17 percent next year on weak demand at home.
Fast Retailing, with ambitions of becoming the top global clothing retailer, reported a net profit of 61.68 billion yen (752 billion dollars), up 24 percent from a year earlier.
However for the current year to August 2011, it estimated a 17 percent lower net profit of 51 billion yen and a 14 percent decline in operating profit to 113.5 billion yen.
"We expect that the apparel retail industry will see severer competition while environments surrounding consumption in domestic and overseas markets will remain difficult," it said.
Earlier this month the company said domestic same-store sales at its Uniqlo outlets fell 25 percent in September from the same month a year earlier -- its biggest fall in seven years, partly on the impact of unseasonal weather taming sales for its autumn collection.
For the year ended August, operating profit rose 22 percent to 132.38 billion yen on sales of 814.8 trillion yen, up 18.9 percent.