It’s not often when a flagging economy can be spun as a positive. However, for export-heavy companies such as Nintendo, a weak Japanese yen equates to a better exchange-rate return on systems sold overseas. The hardware maker said today that it has revised its half- and full-year revenue and income projections upward, thanks in no small part to the volatile US dollar and powerhouse euro.

For the six months ending September 30, Nintendo now expects a net income of ¥165 billion ($1.5 billion) on revenues of ¥830 billion ($7.6 billion), a respective increase of 32 percent and 9.2 percent over previous projections. For Nintendo’s full fiscal year ending March 31, 2009, the publisher now anticipates revenues to soar to ¥2 trillion ($18 billion), an 11.1 percent rise over its previous estimates. Year-end profits are expected to see a similar spike, jumping 26.2 percent over the publisher’s previous forecast to ¥410 billion ($3.8 billion).

Nintendo’s new estimates are based on assumed average exchange rates of ¥105 per US dollar (compared to ¥100 previously) and ¥160 per euro (up from ¥155). As of press time, current exchange rates stand at ¥108 per dollar and ¥159 per euro.

Of course, to capitalize on those exchange rates, the company needs to move a significant amount of product, and Nintendo has had no issues getting its massively popular Wii and DS into gamers’ hands. Nintendo’s consoles have consistently blown away the competition in the global console race.

As per the industry-tracking NPD Group’s July report, Nintendo once again took first and second place in hardware sales in the US, with the Wii’s 555,000 units and DS’s 608,000 units leading the month’s 17 percent year-over-year hardware-sales growth. Five of the top 10 software titles for the month were for Nintendo’s platforms as well, including the first-party hits Wii Fit, Wii Play, and Mario Kart Wii.

By Tom Magrino