Bulgaria’s state-run IT company Information Services PLC posted a 45% lower after-tax profit for the first half of the year compared with a year earlier.

Between January and June, the firm netted BGN 1.268 million in comparison to BGN 2.299 million for the corresponding period of 2009.

Sales slumped by 11%, or by BGN 1.8 million as financial expenses soared by 792%, or BGN 475,000, mostly on the back of a BGN 8.1 million contract for the sale of a receivable with the Bulgarian Development Bank (BDB).

Meanwhile, Bulgaria’s Supreme Administrative Court (SAC) has granted the right to sign IT services contracts with the Ministry of Finance (MoF), rejecting an appeal by Information Services, which was seeking suspension of awarding the public procurement. The court ruling was made at the end of June and cannot be appealed.

The MoF has not yet put pen to paper with the winners in the public procurement and did not reply to inquiries about when it plans to do so. Some of the companies expect to ink the deals by the end of August but others declined to comment.