Figures to the end of April showed sales of Porsche cars fell by 15 percent since the beginning of the fiscal year to 4.6 billion euros ($5.98 billion) down from 5.46 billion euros.

The result did not include sales at Volkswagen, in which Porsche holds a 51 percent stake.

Top-end carmakers have been particularly badly hit by the crisis in the auto industry with sales at BMW and Mercedes also falling sharply this year.

"A look at global unit sales makes clear that no region is being spared the sharp decline in automobile markets," Porsche said Friday in a statement.

Stuttgart-based Porsche said its operating profit also declined but did not provide any details, while deliveries dropped by 27.6 percent to 53,635 vehicles on a 12-month basis.

The release of the results also came as Porsche considers what steps it needs to take to pay back more than 9 billion euros in debt, accrued in its efforts to take a greater stake in VW - Europe's biggest carmaker - through complex stock options.

Porsche and VW have agreed to a merger, but talks over the move have frozen due to the debt issue.

In a capital-raising exercise Porsche is looking to sell a stake of up to 25 percent to the Gulf state Qatar for a figure said to be around 2.5 billion euros.

Porsche has also asked for a bailout deal from the German government of around 1.75 billion euros to help it deal with the debt through private banking loans.

dfm/AFP/dpa

Editor: Jennifer Abramsohn