De La Rue posts 22 pct fall in operating profit

LONDON, May 27 (Reuters) - British banknote printer De LaRue reported a 22 percent fall in underlying operatingprofit on Wednesday, in line with its expectations, due toongoing pricing pressures in the banknote printing market.

The 202 year-old firm said full year operating profit fellto 69.5 million pounds ($107.27 million) for the year endedMarch 28, down from last year's figure of 89.3 million pounds.

De La Rue, which makes over 150 national currencies and UKpassports, warned in November that it expected underlyingoperating profit to be approximately 20 million pounds lowerthan the previous year's figure.($1 = 0.6479 pounds) (Reporting by Li-mei Hoang; editing by Kate Holton)