Summit Alliance Port said its earnings rose in the first half of the current financial year of 2021-22 as its handled an increased volume of containers for international trade during the period.

The net profit of the leading off-dock increased 7 per cent year-on-year to Tk 10.35 crore in the July-December period of 2021 from Tk 9.69 crore a year ago.

"We did not have good business in the first quarter of the financial year because of the pandemic. But our regular business returned in the October-December period," said Company Secretary Md Abdullah Osman Shajid.

The company's shares edged up 3.01 per cent to Tk 27.40 yesterday at Dhaka Stock Exchange.

The company, a concern of Summit Group, posted a 160 per cent surge in its net profit to Tk 5.22 crore in the October-December period from Tk 2.01 crore in the same period a year ago, according to its unaudited half yearly statement.

The company registered a 10 per cent growth in its revenue in the second quarter.

Despite the gain, its overall revenue increased only 2 per cent in the first six months of the current financial year ending in June.

The company's revenue was Tk 85 crore in the July-December period of 2021-22 from Tk 83.63 crore the previous year.

Shajid said business from Inland Water Container Terminal (IWCT), the first-ever terminal in private sector at Muktarpur, Munshiganj, peaked after the National Board of Revenue allowed it to handle to bulk and break-bulk cargo in addition to containers.

The company handled 13.95 crore twenty-foot equivalent units of containers in the year of 2020-21 from 11.71 crore TEUs of containers the previous year, according to its latest annual report.