Nissan's Chief financial officer Thierry Moulonguet told Reuters late on Thursday that faster-than-expected progress in a restructuring programme and strong US sales were likely to result in healthy consolidated first-half results.

``Last year we had 58.5 billion yen in operating profit and this year, in a much tougher exchange rate scenario...I would have a strong expectation that we can do better than last year's figure,'' he said in an interview.

Shares in Japan's third-largest automaker, owned 36.8 per cent by French automaker Renault Sa, ended the morning session up 14.9 per cent or 80 yen at 617, after hitting an early peak of 637 - just a few yen short of a new high for the year. Renault shares also jumped on the brighter outlook, climbing 5.8 per cent to 49.50 euros on Thursday.

Nissan forecast in May an operating profit of 110 billion yen for the full year to next March 31.

Goldman Sachs also raised its investment rating on Nissan to ``recommended list'', equivalent to ``buy'' or ``strong buy'', from ``market outperformer'', providing further support to the shares.

After attending an analysts meeting at the Paris car show with Nissan President Carlos Ghosn, Goldman auto analyst Kunihiko Shiohara raised his estimates for full-year consolidated operating profit to between 150 billion and 200 billion yen.

Last October, Nissan announced a drastic three-year restructuring plan that calls for the closure of five factories, 21,000 job cuts, asset sales and a slashing of supply costs.

Moulonguet said Nissan had sold around 150 billion yen in assets and although he declined to comment on the amount of profit garnered on those sales, he said they would make a significant contribution to net profit for the first half.