TOKYO, Feb 5 (Reuters) - Japanese trading house Mitsubishi Corp said its net profit for the nine months to December fell 26.5% on weak coking coal prices and the absence of one-off gains, but maintained its full-year profit forecast due to uncertainty ahead of year-end.

Nine-month profit came in at 607.9 billion yen ($3.88 billion), it said. It forecasts net profit for the current fiscal year at 700 billion yen, down from 950.7 billion yen the previous year.

Profit was hit by factors including a slumping coking coal market and the absence of a one-off gain from the sale of Australian coal mines booked a year earlier, but all businesses performed better than anticipated, Chief Financial Officer Yuzo Nouchi said.

"Full-year earnings may exceed our forecast, but we have left it unchanged for now given uncertainty ahead of the fiscal year-end," he told a press conference.

Mitsubishi, which still owns five coking coal mines in Australia, has been working to improve productivity.

Nouchi said fourth-quarter production will be hit by torrential rains and issues at one mine, but productivity measures are progressing and volumes are expected to recover by fiscal 2027.

On coking coal, he said excess steel production in China is capping demand growth, but rising demand in India should support a moderate recovery in prices. On copper, where Mitsubishi is expanding, he said supply-demand fundamentals indicate a very strong medium- to long-term outlook.

Last month, Mitsubishi said it would buy U.S. shale assets from Aethon Energy Management for $7.53 billion, its largest deal to date. Nouchi said the assets are already operating, allowing for profit contribution from the first year.

Reuters reported in January that Mitsubishi and Shell are exploring sale options for their stakes in the C$40 billion ($29.2 billion) LNG Canada project. Nouchi said nothing has been decided.

($1 = 156.8100 yen)

($1 = 1.3695 Canadian dollars)

(Reporting by Katya Golubkova and Yuka Obayashi; Editing by Jacqueline Wong, Bernadette Baum and Jan Harvey)

By Yuka Obayashi and Katya Golubkova