United Development Company Q.P.S.C. (UDCD) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Hello, everyone, and welcome to United Development Conference Call. Please note that this call is being recorded. I'd now like to hand over to Roy Thomas, our moderator for today.

Thanks, Eli. Hello, everyone. This is Roy Thomas from QNB Financial Services. I want to welcome everyone to United Development Company's Third Quarter and 9-Months 2024 Financial Results Conference Call. On this call from United Development Company, we have Maher Omar Naim, the Executive Director for Financial Planning; and Karim Farhat, the Executive Director for Finance. We will conduct this conference call with management first reviewing the company's results followed by Q&A. I will turn the call now over to Maher Naim. Go ahead, Maher.

Hello, everyone. I hope everyone is well. I will go over the financial results of United Development Company for the year ending September 30, 2024. The company has achieved a revenue of QAR 1.2 billion for the 9 months period with a net profit of QAR 241 million and which is an increase of 5% than prior year, while the net profit attributable to the equity shareholder is QAR 242 million, also with an increase of 5%. Earnings per share is QAR 0.068 compared to QAR 0.065. As you are aware, we are at the last stage of development for the mixed-use building where the units will be ready, hopefully, for handover during -- for a physical handover during the year 2024 should the investors are available for handover, okay? And the Crystal Walk, if you can see on The Pearl, has been also completed in its final stages. So this is the current status. And the main transaction that UDC been working with on Qatar Cool deal, we have signed the SBA. This was beyond Q3. It was done in May 16 or something like this, in middle of May 2024, where we are now working on the condition precedence to complete such conditions and then the transaction will be completed accordingly. So again, UDC is looking very much forward for continuing it and finishing its development in the Gewan Island based on the development of land and to execute the sale of Qatar Cool, 40% shares in Qatar Cool as soon as possible. Should you have any questions, please go ahead.

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Seki Mutukwa from Ashmore.

Just 3 questions, please, from me. The first one is just what drove the sort of very high net income in the third quarter within urban development in terms of, are there sort of one-offs? Or was it sort of land sales with very high margin? Just to try to understand that. Second question, do you think you'll be able to sort of conclude the Qatar Cool transaction this calendar year? Or are you sort of baking in a little bit of room for maybe 2025? And then the final one is just in terms of Pearl International Hospital, how many beds is that supposed to be?

Yes. The urban development income, if you see it, it's lesser than prior period than September 2023 a bit. And as we said, because the majority of our real estate products were sold and completed, and now we are keen on the sale and recognition of Gewan units, hopefully, 2025, beginning of 2025. Second question, yes, Qatar Cool deal, it will be concluded as planned in the year 2024. And The Pearl International Hospital, it's 65 beds. And it is a general hospital that has everything, yes, including specialty beds rooms.

Okay. Just to quickly follow up on the first point. I didn't fully understand. You said that the urban development profitability is from -- related to Gewan sales primarily or just trying to understand what...

Yes, it is mix of land plot and units. And as we mentioned before, land plots, there were land plots recognized. The remaining last portion of Gewan plot have been recognized in the year 2024. And now the majority -- all our plots have been recognized. And as we see, as we have stated that we are working on recognizing the revenue from our sale of the mixed-use building.

[Operator Instructions] As of right now, we don't have any pending questions. I'd now like to hand back over to Roy for further remarks.

If there are no further questions, we would like to thank Maher Omar Naim on behalf of United Development Company for the results update and answering all the -- answering the query, and we look forward to speaking to you all for the final quarter results. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Thank you. Bye-bye.

Thank you for attending today's call. You may now disconnect. Have a wonderful day.