AFS Announces Mid Year Net Profit at US $5.873 million

CEO: rapid growing payment volumes and payment convergence will enable more business growth

Manama – Kingdom of Bahrain, 8 August 2006

Arab Financial Services Company B.S.C. (c) (AFS), the region’s leading provider of electronic-payments and consumer finance-outsourcing services, announced its first mid year results for 2006 at a net profit of US $5.873 million.

The figures mark a 323% growth compared to the first half of 2005 at $1.387 million. The company achieved operating profits (excluding all exceptional items) of $2.554 million, 72% higher than same period in 2005.

AFS also reported a return on Equity of 18.9% for YTD June 2006 vs. 4.8% YTD 2005. The return on equity on core card processing business is 13.5% compared to 2005 which was 8.9%. Net book value of “per” shares is $10.37 as of 30-Jun-06.

In commenting on the result the Arab Financial Services the Company Chairman Mr. Ghazi M. Abdul Jawad, said, "Our 2006 financial results support the growth that AFS is sustaining, and reinforces its position as the region's leading provider for end-to-end card processing solutions and consumer finance outsourcing services. Our viable financial base and healthy cash flow will enable us to continue making the right resource and technical investments in order to strengthen our business proposition in the future".

Mr Rasool Hujair, Arab Financial Services CEO said: “We are pleased with our half year results, we have seen significant uptake in our core processing service and also new revenue streams from recent initiatives such as EMV. The outlook for the remaining of the year looks positive as we continue to expand our services proposition farther.”

Elaborating on such outstanding results, Mr. Hujair explained “Market factors such as regulatory change, rapidly growing payment volumes and payments convergence are creating new opportunities for AFS. Our new business is growing and we continue to sell a wide range of evolving solutions into our existing customer base. Important industry mandates such as the EMV smart card initiative are creating new processing opportunities for us which we are well positioned to exploit,” said Hujair.

“We have now rebranded all of our solutions under the new AFS brand,” added Hujair. “The power of the brand is beginning to pay dividends in terms of new business opportunities, both in specific geographic regions and with global players.”