Dubai’s Drake & Scull Q1 net profit falls 61%

Dubai’s Drake & Scull (DSI) posted a 61 per cent fall in first-quarter net profit on Sunday, extending an earnings slump as its revenue declined.

The contractor made a net profit attributable to shareholders of Dhs 9.8m ($2.67m) in the three months to March 31, it said in a statement. This compares with a profit of Dhs 25.1m in the year-earlier period.

EFG Hermes forecast DSI would make a quarterly net profit of Dhs 20.1m.

DSI had reported worsening earnings in seven of the preceding eight quarters, a slump it blamed on a slowdown in the Gulf construction sector. This included a substantial loss in the third quarter of 2015 due to provisioning.

DSI’s first-quarter revenue was Dhs 1.03bn, down 7.2 per cent from Dhs 1.11bn a year earlier.

Costs shrank by a smaller margin, falling 5.1 per cent to Dhs 956.1m.