Dubai's Emaar Properties, builder of the world's tallest tower, swung to a second-quarter profit, though losses on a unit sale and other one-off charges kept a cap on earnings.

The Arab world's largest listed developer made a second-quarter net profit of Dh802 million ($218.4 million), compared with a loss of Dh1.29 billion in the same period last year.

Analysts' average forecast was for a profit of Dh968.45 million, according to a Reuters survey.

Emaar had posted a $351 million loss in the second-quarter of 2009 after it wrote off the book value of its US unit.

Net operating profit for the second quarter was Dh896 million, Emaar said, after the firm booked a Dh53 million loss on the sale of a subsidiary in the UK and wrote off Dh41 million in an associated company.

Emaar's shares closed flat at Dh3.4 on the Dubai bourse.

Dubai's once-booming property sector has been hit hard by the financial crisis, with house prices dropping about 60 per cent from their peaks in 2008, and billions of dollars worth of projects put on hold or cancelled.

In the first quarter, Emaar saw net profit more than triple to 760 million dirhams on revenues from its hospitality and retail business.

The developer has said it would focus on expanding in the Middle East, North Africa and South Asia in 2010.

Among Emaar's high-profile assets is Dubai Mall, the world's largest shopping centre, and the developer also has a joint venture with Italian fashion house Georgio Armani to develop luxury hotels globally. – Reuters