International Container Terminal Services, Inc. (ICTSI) reported an 11% increase in net income to US$168.1 million in the first nine months of 2017, up from $150.8 million earned in the same period last year.
For the third quarter of the year alone, however, net income dropped 9% to $53 million from $58.2 million in the same quarter in 2016, according to the port operator’s disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange.
Gross revenues from port operations for the first nine months of 2017 increased 10% to $918.3 million from the $835 million reported in the same period in 2016, ICTSI said in a press statement. The growth was mainly due to volume growth, tariff rate adjustments at certain terminals, new contracts with shipping lines and services, and the contribution of the company’s new terminals in Matadi, Congo, and in Melbourne, Australia. Excluding the two new terminals, consolidated gross revenues would have increased by only 6%.
For the third quarter of the year alone, gross revenues rose 11% to $314.6 million from $284.2 million.
For the first nine months of the year, ICTSI’s ports handled consolidated volume of 6.837 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), or 6% higher than the 6.435 million TEUs serviced in the same period in 2016. The increase was primarily due to continuing improvement in global trade activities, particularly in the emerging markets; continuing ramp-up at ICTSI’s operations in Basra, Iraq; new services at Manzanillo, Mexico; and the contribution of the new terminals in Matadi and Melbourne. Without the new terminals, consolidated volume would have increased by 5%.
For the third quarter of 2017 alone, total consolidated throughput rose 6% to 2.291 million TEUs compared to 2.171 million TEUs in the same period last year. Excluding the new terminals, consolidated volume would have increased by only 3%.
Capital expenditure for the first three quarters of 2017 amounted to $113.5 million, about 47% of the $240 million capital expenditure budget for the full year 2017. The established budget is mainly allocated for the completion of the initial stage of development of greenfield projects in Congo and Iraq; the second stage of development of the project in Australia; continuing development of container terminals in Mexico and Honduras; and capacity expansion of the firm’s terminal operations in Manila.
In addition, ICTSI invested $25.2 million in Sociedad Puerto Industrial Aguadulce S.A. in Buenaventura, Colombia to fund the completion of the initial phase of development and finance the start-up operations of its joint venture container terminal project with PSA International.
ICTSI, which has an experience record spanning 18 countries in six continents, is a global developer, manager, and operator of container terminals in the 50,000- to 2.5-million-TEU annual range.
