TRIBUNE NEWS NETWORK & REUTERS

DOHA Qatar Telecommunications (Qtel) on Sunday said quarterly profits jumped 59 percent, buoyed by a one-time gain at its Kuwaiti unit.

Qtel posted net profit of QR1,044 billion ($287 million) in the second quarter, up from QR658.5 million in the prioryear period.

Qtel booked a QR343 million gain after its Kuwait business, National Mobile Telecommunications (Wataniya), won a court ruling reversing provisions it had set aside in a dispute with Kuwait’s ministry of communications.

Commenting on the results, Chairman of the Qtel Group HE Sheikh Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Saud al Thani said: “We have achieved consistent and demonstrable gains across our operations, delivering 42 percent revenue growth and 38 percent net profit growth during the period.

We continue to concentrate on consolidating our position in key markets and maximising efficiencies to ensure continuing profit growth for the benefit of all our stakeholders.” Chief Executive Officer of the Qtel Group Dr.

Nasser Marafih said, “We have deepened our presence across our international markets in the period and have worked hard to stay close to our customers’ needs ensuring that we increasingly become the communications service provider of choice in the markets in which we operate.

We continue to transform the business by sharing best practice and extracting revenue and cost synergies across the Group, positioning our operations for further profitable growth.” One analyst had forecast profit of QR615 million in the quarter, according to a Reuters survey in July.

“Certainly it’s not an outstanding result, which it appears to be at first glance,” said Kunal Bajaj, an analyst at HSBC.

“It’s more or less in line with expectations.” Consolidated revenues rose 30 percent to QR5.9 billion in the quarter ended June 30, up from 4.6 billion a year ago.

The company, which does not provide earnings forecasts, said the outlook for the second half of the year seemed positive.

Qtel said it earned profit of QR1.64 billion in the first half of the year on revenues of 11.54 billion.

That is up from QR1.2 billion in the same period last year, on revenues of QR8.1 billion.

Total customers stood at 52.2 million as of June 30, up 2 percent from the same period last year.

Qtel, which owns a controlling stake in Indonesia’s second largest telecoms firm, said Indosat contributed the most to both customer base and revenues, with 29.4 million customers and QR3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2009.

Qtel shares closed up 3.28 percent on the Doha index.