NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - DaimlerChrysler expects to see improved profits this year and forecasts continued bottom-line gains in upcoming years, according to its chairman.

Speaking at the company's shareholders' meeting in Berlin on Wednesday, DaimlerChrysler (Research) Chairman Dieter Zetsche did not give specific earnings targets. The company said it will give more a more detailed outlook when it releases first-quarter results April 27. But he said that the company is on the right path to improved profits.

"We've set ourselves challenging but realistic goals that we intend to achieve within the foreseeable future," he said in his prepared remarks.

The company earned $3.41 a share in 2005, excluding special items, up from $3.33 in 2004 and $2.27 in 2003. Analysts surveyed by earnings tracker First Call forecast that the company's full-year earnings per share will rise 23 percent to $4.30 this year, and further to $4.78 in 2007.

The company also announced it is leaving its dividend unchanged at 1.50 a share this year. But the outlook and dividend news sent shares of DaimlerChrysler down 0.8 percent in Frankfurt trading early Wednesday.

Zetsche, who was promoted from running the company's Chrysler Group unit to running the whole company in 2005, pointed to both job cuts at its corporate headquarters and luxury Mercedes division, as well as new vehicle introductions, in helping to achieve the improved profit.

The company previously announced plans to trim 6,000 administrative positions and 8,500 jobs at Mercedes. The company said 7,800 Mercedes employees have already accepted buyout offers.

The company's North American unit, Chrysler Group, will introduce 10 new models, or more than it ever has before. Chrysler, the company's largest unit, has seen significantly better financial fortunes than the two other U.S.-based automakers, General Motors Corp. (Research) and Ford Motor Co. (Research), which both have seen losses on its core North American auto operations coupled with declining market share.

After posting a 4.5 percent gain in U.S. sales for Chrysler in 2005, the company has had a 2.8 percent rise in first-quarter U.S. sales.

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For a look at Chrysler's jab at Big Oil, click here.