Riyadh – Mubasher: The Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) on Wednesday reported a 32% year-on-year decline in net losses during the fourth quarter of 2018, while profits slumped 74% for the full fiscal year of 2018.

The Saudi electric utility’s losses after calculating Zakat and Tax amounted to SAR 3.77 billion from October to December 2018, against SAR 5.52 billion in Q4-17, according to a statement to the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul).

The firm attributed the fourth-quarter loss decline to the inclusion of non-recurring costs related to the human resources productivity programme in Q4-17.

Revenues rose 14% to SAR 13.03 billion during the October-December period of 2018, versus SAR 11.47 billion in the prior-year period.

Operational losses tumbled 44.5% to SAR 2.13 billion by the end of December, compared to SAR 3.84 billion in Q3-17.

Quarter-on-quarter, SEC turned to losses, after achieving SAR 4.92 billion in profits in Q3-18.

The company’s profits after calculating Zakat and Tax plunged to SAR 1.8 billion for the full year 2018, from SAR 6.91 billion a year earlier.

The 2018 profit decline was attributed to the inclusion of a non-recurring income resulted from a reversal of cancelled municipalities’ fees.

Sales jumped 27% to SAR 64.06 billion from January to December 2018, compared to SAR 50.69 billion in 2017.

Operational profits fell 40% to SAR 6.04 billion last year, compared to SAR 10 billion in 2017.

Earnings per share (EPS) hit SAR 0.43, down from SAR 1.66.