Friday 23 April 2010

Etisalat Press


Well well well, the Q1 results for 2010 are out and Etisalat has made just under 2 billion dirhams in profits.
This is an offensively large amount of money especially for a small country (UAE has about 5 million people) that is going through a recession of sorts.

If this performance continues all through the year, and you cut a bit off for inefficiencies and what not, you will get a grand profit of about 7 bn dirhams a year! Just to clarify that's about $2bn! This qualifies Etisalat in my opinion to practically print money for its shareholders. It's a printing press, plain and simple.

To get an idea what this money could do, 7 bn shared over the whole UAE population would mean each one of us gets a handsome 1400 Dhs a year.. this equates to about the price of a good mobile phone. Now since it's only possible for Emaratis to buy Etisalat shares, we can safely assume that only Emaratis will profit from their profit.

So, for every Emarati there are 4 expats, this means that each one of us gets 5600 Dhs.. which could handsomely cover my annual fuel bill for my gas guzzling V8 SUV and bike, and this includes the coming 10-15% hike in prices.



http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20100418-703266.html?mod=WSJ_World_MIDDLEHeadlinesMideast

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

1. The UAE has about 7 million residents now.

2. I've seen the dividend checks from Etisalat, they are nice. MIght as well be a money printing press. But then again, that was the idea, to be an income to supplement Emaratis. Though I had a Syrian client come in with 3 dividend checks yesterday... So Im not sure if the no foreigners allowed thing is true.

3. A decent phone costs more like 2000 these days.

4. How the hell is your ANNUAL gas bill for an SUV 5600 when my MONTHLY bill is about 3000? You need to get out more more!

5. Didnt I post some picture a while back about how Etisalat is part of the evil empire? Its a fact we all know. Them and their SMSs, come upgrade your innerwebs! while the damn cable somewhere off the coast of God knows where is cut AGAIN.

And I still cant access my iPhone's app store...

My rule on companies in the UAE... if they have the color green in their logo, they are probably part of the evil empire.

BuJ said...

hello... when did u comment? i never got the e-mail!

shit.. 7 million.. that's too much.. bet u that uae nationals did not increase in the same proportion.

btw, i don't think a private company should provide "an income to supplement Emaratis".

my annual gas bill is quite modest, since i don't drive too much (work>home is close) and i do most social driving not by car but by bike.

so when u go from 8 cylinders and 5.7 litres to 2 cylinders and 0.7 litres, you need much less gas!

Etisalat is evil indeed.. it's not part of the evil empire,, it IS the evil empire.

who else is in the evil empire? dewa? emarat? enoc? adnoc is blue, so it's safe!

Dave said...

Why does that Etisalat poster with the fingerprint scare the hell out of me.... it is very "big brother"...

Tainted Female said...

I <3 Etisalat. I don't care what anyone says.

rosh said...

Me too Tainted :) It's the telecommunications company that grew with the country and most of us -- much history there. Subsequent to grumbling / cussing the slow net and its charges..can't actually hate 'em..perhaps we are emotional fools! :)

BuJ, despite the 'low' rates, the Verizon cell bill has a TON of surcharges and taxes..I don't know if I'm paying for usage or taxes? Plus the cable / Internet service require a 12 month commitment AND has many hidden charges (almost like dating in this city). So, I'd take Etisalat over Voldemort. It's all relative I suppose -- 2 fils worth.

CG said...

Hmmm
I am here to say Hi and not comment on Etisalat....oh ok, if I must.... They are sometimes great, and then again, they are crap.Evertime it rains, my box thingy on the wall outside in the street fills with water and the lines go down, phone, internet etcc. Everytime we have to call them out, and when they arrive they want to check all over the house and beyond for the stupid effing fault, when I keep telling them to go outside with a towel and dry it up. they look at me like I am mad, and then after they have done it, they ask me how I knew? I ask them to leave the box unlocked so I can dry it up myself (or seal it), but they say it will never happen again. For 10 years it has been doing this, every time we have 3 drops of rain.
Ahh yes, the cheques from Eitisalat...they come in handy too. I did not realise they were to supplement our meagre incomes...

Anonymous said...
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Dubai Sunshine said...

You'd think that a teeny tiny portion of that profit would be invested towards a training program for their customer service department.

But nooo.....that would be asking too much now...wouldn't it?

BuJ said...

dave,, that fingerprint poster IS BAD..

i googled etisalat and i found it,, otherwise i never seen it b4

it's too bad to be ignored, so i posted it.

Rosh and Tainted! GET OUT OF MY WAY!

hello GC BOSS! how ru?

ru saying that Etisalat now maintains its network with TOWELS?

fucking typical!

DS.. ya hala!
btw, all the stupid customer services guys are in egypt now.. no comment.

last time i had to call them to fix our disconnected land line they threatened me with a charge if the problem was from my end! it was a threat!!

i told them i checked everything but there is no dial tone, then they conceded and sent an engineer

the dumb fuck insisted on visiting my office even when i told him my HOME LAND LINE was disconnected.

for some reason he thought the problem was perhaps with me or my boss rather than the etisalat line at home (minus the dial-tone)

life!

BuJ said...

oh ABIT.. btw, i just noticed that u said "gas bill".. well.. here in the UAE we say "petrol" hahahaha

as in BATROWL!!!

rosh said...

Long live Etisalat. Down with 'Du'hooo! haha :) OK bad joke.

Etisalat has its customer service outsourced to somewhere in Egypt? No disrespect, but holy fucks! why? That's screwing up not just the company but everything else. Why would Etisalat (of all fuloos printing firms) wish to outsource?

Dubai Sunshine said...

Had no idea re: the outsourcing to Egypt.

On top of which, they threaten you?? 7elo kteer :)

BuJ said...

Rosh, Dubai Sunshine.. try calling their eat-shit numbers and see who picks up.

Du even has their 155 guys in Egypt.

but Du is a new company and it's tiny, so i don't mind that.. they wanna save and survive in eat-khara's shadow.. oh well...

BuJ said...

think how many jobs were lost in the emirates coz of this.

already we have a lot of expats and high emarati unemployment.

smart move from a company that can be almost considered governmental.