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RIYADH: Saudi telecom operator Etihad Etisalat Co.’s former executives were ordered to jointly pay SR1.23 billion ($328 million) for committing misleading actions.

The Appeal Committee for Resolution of Securities Disputes issued this decision on Aug. 8, on the class action brought by an investor in the firm — also known as Mobily — against five former executives, a bourse filing revealed on Sept. 8.

The ACRSD decision also ordered the former executives to contribute to the payment of SR12,000 for lawyer fees to the main claimant.

There are a total of 1,045 claimants who are eligible to receive compensation as a result of this case, as stated in the statement.

The former executives include Badr Alturaifi, Muhammad Thabet, Khaled Alkaf, Thamer Alhosani, and Ahmad Abdulnabi.

In June, the ACRSD ordered the defendants in a class action against five former executives of Mobily to pay the plaintiffs SR1.2 billion.

The telecom firm reported a 44.5 percent boost in profit for the first half of 2022 to SR679 million.

The higher profit was backed by a 5.2 percent year-on-year rise in revenue to SR8 billion, on growth in wholesale, business and consumer segments.

During the second quarter of 2022, its net profit after Zakat and tax climbed 48 percent to SR360 million, up from SR243.8 million in the same period last year, exceeding estimates.

The second quarter results were helped by a 4.6 percent year-over-year revenue growth to SR4 billion.

Mobily said in March that it joined the Southeast Asia-Middle East-Western Europe consortium for the construction of a 19,200-kilometer subsea cable system connecting Saudi Arabia with 10 other Middle East, South Asian, and Western European countries.

On May 31, it announced that it signed a strategic memorandum of understanding with Telecom Egypt for the construction of the first direct bilateral submarine cable system linking Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

On Aug. 18, 2004, Mobily was incorporated as a joint stock company. As soon as the telco’s incorporation announcement was made on Dec. 14, 2004, its operations began.

As of Dec. 20, 2004, Mobily, which is one of the Kingdom’s largest mobile operators, was listed on the Saudi Stock Exchange, and as of Sep. 7 its stock price stood at SR37 per share, with a traded value of SR33 million.