KUWAIT: Investment Dar, the Kuwaiti Islamic firm which owns half of British luxury car maker Aston Martin, said it is upbeat on net profit growth in the third quarter after a slight decline in the second quarter.
"Yes, I'm very optimistic. Not only optimistic, I'm sure of it," executive vice-president Amr Abou El Seoud said when asked about profit growth expectations for the third quarter.
He declined to give a profit forecast for this year but said Dar was also upbeat about the full-year growth after boosting net profit by 37 per cent last year, adding its business was not exposed to any risky US investments despite various bank partnerships.
"We have been very prudent with our investments. We don't have any exposure to US investments," El Seoud said.
Investment Dar posted a 0.3pc decline in the second-quarter.
Dar has joint ventures or partnerships with banks including Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, Merrill Lynch, HSBC, and Morgan Stanley.
"Our partnerships with international banks are pure business partnerships rather than equity partnerships, so we are not affected at all," he said.
He also saw no impact from a slide of the local stock market, which has sharply fallen like other Gulf markets after Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy.
Dar owns shares in the Kuwaiti bourse but they were booked at book value and do not have to reflect market prices in their quarterly reports, he said.
"Dar is not affected by the stock exchange, we do have shares in the stock exchange but they are valued at book value," he said.
The Islamic firm is also looking for property bargains in the US and Europe, it says.
"We might consider investments such as Grosvenor which are unique and unmatchable," he said.
In 2006, Dar bought Grosvenor House Apartments, which owns the Grosvenor House Hotel in London's Park Lane, for £250 million ($446.7m).
Dar, which is tapping growth opportunities in other markets to diversify its revenue sources is also considering selling sukuk, to finance its expansion, but would wait until credit markets improve before going ahead.
"We are in the final stages of agreeing but we are not sure if this is the correct time or market to sell it," El Seoud added.
