National Bonds investors’ may be a bit anxious and apprehensive about the delay in announcement of the 2011 profit rate so far, but the company says "bondholders need not worry".

In an emailed statement sent to 'Emirates24|7', the Shariah-complaint saving scheme said: “National Bonds Corporation’s policy is to distribute the annual profits of a given year within the first quarter of the following year.

At the moment, we are still in the process of finalising the books with all relevant third parties such as our external auditors and Shariah Board. Nevertheless, our bondholders are still enjoying weekly and monthly rewards on their savings.”.

It added that the profits will be issued retroactively in the form of profit bonds backdated to January 1, 2012 so the date of the announcement will not affect the profits of our bondholders.

National Bonds had announced the annual profit rate of 3.78 per cent for 2010 on January 31, 2011.

Bondholders are already venting their anxiety on the social networking sites.

Shabeebur Rehman Mecheri’s comment on Facebook reads: “Profit is d only relief for those people who r dreaming abt winnig prizes and hv not won even a single dirham so far. So ........pleeeeeees. (sic)”

While Shahul Ahmed wrote: “Pleaseeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee profit (sic)”, Quresh Saifee said: “NBC if you remain little bit of courtesy & Care for your customer we must need the reply for our Profit date its getting too much delayed now & we have doubt on your intensions now (sic).”

Speaking to this website, Anesh Shaikh, an expat from Sri Lanka, said:

“I have been waiting for the profit announcement for some time now. Last year, the announcement came in early February and before that it came by January end… then why haven’t they announced the profit yet.”

In December 2011, Company CEO Mohammed Qasim Al Ali told this website that they had registered a 17 per cent increase in sales till end-November 2011 compared to the same period 2010.

“So far, we have a 17 per cent sales growth compared to the same period last year. We have also witnessed an increase in our customer base from 607,000 to more than 650,000 customers this year, a growth of 7.18 per cent compared to last year,” he had said.

The company is wholly owned by the Investment Corporation of Dubai, which acquired the remaining 50 per cent stake from Emaar Properties, Dubai Holding and Dubai Bank, in March 2011.