TOKYO, Jan 6 (Reuters) - Seven & I Holdings, Japan's top retailer, posted a 3 percent rise in its nine-month operating profit, as revenue from its core convenience store segment rose, and kept its annual outlook unchanged.
The retailer, which operates the country's No.1 convenience store chain Seven-Eleven, on Thursday reported a March-November operating profit of 175.8 billion yen ($2.11 billion).
Pent-up demand from shoppers who made sharp spending cuts against a weak economic backdrop is expected to have boosted retailers' profits in the latter part of 2010. Cost-cutting measures may also have helped, analysts say.
Seven & I, which competes with retail conglomerate Aeon Co Ltd, kept its operating profit forecast for the business year to February 2011 at 240 billion yen. This is in line with the average forecast of a survey of 17 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
The company's shares gained 14 percent last year, outperforming a 3 percent decline in the benchmark Nikkei average. ($1=83.24 Yen) (Reporting by James Topham; Editing by Dhara Ranasinghe and Edmund Klamann)