KUWAIT - National Mobile Telecommunications Co. NMTC.KW (Wataniya), Kuwait’s second mobile phone operator, posted a 131 percent jump in first-quarter profit, its biggest quarterly earnings on record.
The firm, in which Qatar Telecommunications Co. QTEL.QA (Qtel) bought a majority stake in March, made 25.74 million dinars ($88.90 million) in the three months to March 31, compared with 11.15 million dinars in the year-earlier period, it said in a statement on the bourse Web site.
Earnings per share more than doubled to 56.84 fils in the first three months, from 24.72 fils a year ago. There are 1,000 fils to the dinar.
Wataniya did not explain the rise in earnings, which were the highest for a single quarter according to Reuters statistics going back to 2004.
The company’s former Chairman Faisal al-Ayyar told Wataniya’s annual shareholder meeting in March he expected the firm’s net profit to grow by 20-25 percent in 2007.
Wataniya has expanded abroad with mobile phone networks in Iraq, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia, Algeria and the Maldives.
Qtel bought 51 percent of Wataniya from a consortium led by Kuwait Projects Co. KRPO.KW for $3.72 billion in March, the largest-ever Gulf Arab telecom acquisition.
Qtel said earlier this month a court had been asked to shut down Wataniya’s Iraq affiliate, Asiacell Telecommunication Co., which contributed 49.7 million dinars to Wataniya’s net profit in 2006, the single-largest non-Kuwait contributor.
Source: Khaleej Times
No comments:
Post a Comment