Dubai – Mubasher: Marka reported narrowing its losses year-on-year in the third quarter of 2016 by 16.3%, according to a filing to the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) on Tuesday.

The company posted AED 11.98 million ($3.26 million) in net losses in Q3-16 compared to AED 14.31 million ($3.9 million) in the year-ago period.

Marka’s revenues stood at AED 65.9 million, while EBITDA was positive at AED 4.2 million.

Net losses for the first nine months of 2016 widened 101.7% year-on-year to AED 48.59 million, from AED 24.09 million.

Marka previously reported a net loss of AED 36.9 million in the first half of 2016, up 251% from AED 10.5 million in the same period of 2015.

“The results for this quarter reflect the company’s sale in Q3-16 of a stake in Cheeky Monkeys Playland & Sweet Surprises,” the DFM statement said.

Marka’s vice-chairman and managing director, Khaled Almheiri commented that “Despite the slowdown in the retail environment in general, the decline in the usual activity in this sector during the summer season…due mainly to the downturn in tourism as well as it being a time when most of our customers are on vacation, our food and beverage operations continue to be extremely resilient.”

He added that Marka’s priority was to build the best retail company in the Middle East.