AD Ports bets on trade corridors

AD Ports Group has used its 2025 Annual Report to make a broader point than a set of earnings figures: Abu Dhabi’s state-backed ports and logistics champion is seeking to prove that scale, corridor strategy and selective overseas expansion can keep lifting returns even as conflict, tariff friction and supply-chain disruption continue to unsettle global trade. The company said revenue for 2025 reached AED 20.77 billion and total net profit AED 2.07 billion, both records, with growth of 20 per cent and 16 per cent respectively from 2024.

Those gains were driven mainly by the Ports, Economic Cities and Free Zones, and Maritime and Shipping clusters, according to the company’s report and earlier full-year results statement. EBITDA rose to AED 5.1 billion, while the group said it generated positive free cash flow for the full year for the first time since its 2022 market listing, a milestone that matters to investors watching whether the group’s acquisition-led build-out can translate into stronger cash generation rather than only higher turnover. Fitch and Moody’s maintained investment-grade ratings of AA- and A1 respectively with stable outlooks, underscoring confidence in its balance sheet despite heavy capital spending.

The annual report, titled Curating Connectivity, presents that performance as the product of an “intelligent internationalisation” strategy that has pushed revenue and profit to more than five times their 2020 levels. Chairman Mohamed Hassan Alsuwaidi said the results reflected the resilience of a diversified business model and the confidence of customers, partners and investors. Chief executive Captain Mohamed Juma Al Shamisi said the group had continued to connect ports, maritime services, logistics platforms and economic zones into a single operating ecosystem. The company said its customer base expanded by almost 20 per cent during 2025, while spending by its top 10 customers increased by about 40 per cent, suggesting that cross-selling across the network is becoming a larger part of the story.

A large part of that narrative rests on Khalifa Port, which AD Ports said climbed to 39th place in Lloyd’s List’s ranking of the world’s biggest container ports in 2025, up from 95th in 2019. The group and CMA CGM agreed in November 2025 to expand their joint CMA Terminals Khalifa Port facility less than a year after its opening in December 2024. The expansion is designed to raise the terminal’s capacity by 50 per cent to 2.7 million TEUs and lift Khalifa Port’s total container handling capacity to 10.5 million TEUs. That project, valued at AED 420 million, points to the company’s conviction that Abu Dhabi can capture a larger share of east-west and regional cargo flows, supported by inland links such as the Al Faya Dry Port that AD Ports inaugurated in February 2025.

Beyond Abu Dhabi, Egypt remained one of the clearest examples of where the group sees long-term value. In May 2025, AD Ports signed a 50-year renewable usufruct agreement with the Suez Canal Economic Zone to develop the 20 square kilometre KEZAD East Port Said industrial and logistics zone, with an initial first phase of 2.8 square kilometres and an estimated $120 million earmarked for studies and development over three years. The company also disclosed in its 2025 results that it acquired a 19.328 per cent stake in Alexandria Container & Cargo Handling Co for EGP 13.2 billion and signalled its intention to seek majority ownership. Taken together, those moves show the group is not only buying access to terminals, but trying to anchor industrial and logistics activity around them.

The same corridor logic can be seen elsewhere in its portfolio. AD Ports took a 20 per cent stake in the Latakia International Container Terminal in Syria alongside CMA CGM, joined a 30-year concession for a new dry bulk terminal in Douala, Cameroon, and continued building scale across Pakistan, sub-Saharan Africa and the Mediterranean. Its February results statement said the group’s 34 port terminals in 2025 were being increasingly interconnected with associated maritime and logistics services, while by February 2026 its wider portfolio had grown to 36 terminals and a presence in more than 50 countries. That widening footprint is central to management’s argument that customers want one operator able to provide port access, shipping services, storage, industrial land and logistics under one umbrella.

Still, the report also reflects a tougher operating backdrop than the headline numbers alone might suggest. AD Ports acknowledged that 2025 was shaped by regional conflict, weakening macroeconomic conditions, tariffs and continued supply-chain disruption. Its earnings material said Red Sea rerouting remained a defining feature through the year, with many mainline operators still diverting around the Cape of Good Hope rather than fully returning to the Suez Canal route. That turbulence has helped some operators in feeder shipping and alternative corridor logistics, but it also keeps freight markets volatile and complicates planning for port operators betting on stable trade volumes.