RIYADH: Arabian Centres Co. announced a higher first-half profit of SR374 million ($99 million), boosted by a 13 percent increase in revenue. In response to the announcement, the firm’s shares increased 0.42 percent to reach SR19.08 at the end of Thursday. Its profits jumped 72 percent from SR217 billion in the same period last year, with sales exceeding SR1.14 billion year-over-year, the retail operator said in a filing. Sales growth was driven by higher net rental revenues, as a result of sustained declines in the weighted average rental discount rate, higher occupancy, and secondarily by higher revenue from media sales and utilities, it said. This came despite incurring an impairment loss on investment properties during the first half period following a fire at Mall of Dhahran. The impairment loss on investment properties reached SR25 million, the company which trades in the name of Almarkez said a previous time in a bourse filing.