Riyadh Bank revealed that it was commissioned by the Saudi Telecommunication Company (Etisalat) with arranging a 2.5 billion Saudi riyals ($666.7 million) loan in cooperation with a group of other banks including the Arab National Bank, the Saudi British Bank in Saudi Arabia and the Arab Limited Bank in Jordan.
According to Al-Hayat newspaper, STC will use this loan to finance a number of new projects such as expanding and developing the local mobile network, the domestic telephone system, Internet projects and information services. The company presently operates 3 million fixed telephone lines and 1.2 million mobile telephone lines. Over the past 1.5 years, Etisalat company managed to install 1.3 million telephone lines.
The Saudi Arab Monetary Authority (SAMA) revealed that the Saudi Etisalat had gained SR 14 billion ($3.73 billion) profits last year. The Saudi telecommunication sector is considered the second largest economic sector in Saudi Arabia in terms of the generated treasury’s revenues, after the petroleum sector. — (Albawaba-MEBG)
