Emirati boxship owner DP World's top-line results have gotten a boost from acquiring P&O Ferries and Topaz Energy and Marine last year.
The Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem-led company posted $7.69bn in revenue last year versus $5.65bn in revenue for 2018, primarily as a result of these two acquisitions.
That led to a $1.19m profit attributable to common shareholders versus a $1.3m profit a year earlier.
"Our immediate focus is to integrate our acquisitions and explore synergies with the objective of providing a range of smart end-to-end solutions that will improve the quality of our earnings and drive returns," chief executive Sulayem said in a statement.
The Dubai-listed company, which plans to go private, issued a dividend of $0.40 per share to shareholders for 2019.
DP World last year took over Pan-European logistics platform P&O Ferries and OSV player Topaz Marine & Energy in a $1.1bn merger and folded them into new company P&O Maritime Logistics.
Uncertainty ahead
Despite the top-line gain from these two integrated companies, DP World acknowledges that the coronavirus outbreak has clouded market outlook for the container segment.
"The near-term outlook for the container market currently may appear uncertain given the supply chain disruption caused by the outbreak of the Covid-19 virus but history suggests that trade will remain robust and recover after a period of uncertainty, and we remain positive on the medium to long term outlook for the market," the company said.
"We aim to respond to the near term uncertainty by managing costs, while focusing on integrating our acquisitions to explore revenue synergies and drive earnings growth."
