German car giant Volkswagen said today that its net earnings more than doubled last year and revenues grew by more than a quarter.

Volkswagen said in a preliminary earnings statement that it earned 15.41 billion euros in 2011 - up from 6.84 billion eurosthe previous year.

It credited rights related to Porsche, which it has been trying to take over, as a factor in its pre-tax performance. It gave no fourth-quarter figures.

The company said its revenues rose 25.6% to 159.3 billion euros from the previous year's 126.9 billion euros.

Volkswagen had already reported that it delivered more than 8 million vehicles worldwide last year - a performance which put it ahead of Japan's Toyota.

The company sold nearly 8.27 million vehicles, a 14.7% rise from the previous year's figure of 7.2 million.

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