Business | Telecoms
etisalat's profit meets expectations
Emirates Telecommunications Corp (etisalat) posted a 19-per cent rise in third-quarter profit, meeting analysts' forecasts, as it added more users in a saturated home market and expanded abroad.
- Reuters
- Published: 00:03 October 19, 2008
Dubai: Emirates Telecommunications Corp (etisalat) posted a 19-per cent rise in third-quarter profit, meeting analysts' forecasts, as it added more users in a saturated home market and expanded abroad.
The second-largest Arab telecom firm by market value posted profit in the three months ended on September 30 of Dh2.1 billion, it said in a statement.
The earnings were supported by a 23.8-per cent rise in revenues in the quarter to Dh6.6 billion, data showed. Earnings per share of Dh1.21 in the first nine months compared with Dh0.92 last year, etisalat added. The quarterly profit was in line with the average Dh2.14-billion forecast of three analysts in a survey last month, with estimates ranging from Dh1.9 billion to Dh2.42 billion.
New subscribers
etisalat, which lost its telecom monopoly in 2007 when du started operations, signed on about 220,000 mobile phone users at home in the three months, taking its total UAE mobile phone users to 7.05 million, up 11 per cent from a year earlier.
Last month, etisalat - which operates in 18 countries - also made a debut in India, buying 45 per cent of start-up Swan Telecom for $900 million.
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