Egypt's Talaat Moustafa Q1 profit tumbles 48pct

Talaat Moustafa Group (TMG), Egypt's biggest listed developer that is mired in a legal row over its flagship project, posted a 48 per cent drop in first-quarter net profit on Wednesday.

Net income fell to 169.4 million Egyptian pounds ($28.5 million) from 324.1m pounds in the same period a year earlier, it said in a statement posted on the stock exchange's website.

Revenues were 1.4 billion pounds, down from 1.6bn. Real estate sales slumped 51 per cent.

Egypt's property sector has been hard hit by legal rows over state land sales because of conflicting laws governing them. TMG peers Palm Hills and Egyptian Resorts have already lost land.

TMG is caught up in a row over its flagship $3 billion Madinaty project, which may be prompting clients to hold back from buying TMG homes, some analysts say.

Shares in Talaat Moustafa have slumped 54 per cent, more than double the 30 per cent drop by the benchmark EGX30 index, since the start of the year.

TMG's shares were trading 3.5 per cent higher, while the benchmark index was 1 per cent lower on Wednesday.