Japan's Panasonic profit drops 12% on trade war, higher costs

TOKYO (Reuters) - Panasonic Corp on Thursday reported a 12% drop in its second-quarter operating profit as the Japanese firm was hurt by the Sino-U.S. trade war and higher development costs related to its automotive business in Europe.Still, its September-quarter earnings of 83.9 billion yen ($772.06 million) beat analysts' average estimate of 62.74 billion yen, according to Refinitiv data, as the battery business with Tesla Inc generated profits.A year earlier, Panasonic, the exclusive battery..