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Dubai-based port operator DP World has announced profits for the first half of the year of US$705m, almost four times greater than the US$177m recorded in the same period last year, Port Strategy has reported.

The company attributed the increase to a stronger operating environment, with throughput rising 11 per cent to 26.2m TEU, as well as last year's sale of the company's Australian operations.

However, chief executive Mohammed Sharaf said that it was “more challenging to forecast how global trade will develop in the second half of the year. The impact of this uncertainty has not, as yet, been reflected in the markets in which we operate.”

Sharaf also suggested that the group would continue to focus on expansion and named Libya as a possibility since the Gaddafi regime appeared to be on its way out.