Croatia's largest telecom company, Hrvatski Telekom (HT), said on Tuesday it would pay a 490 million kuna (€66.1 million) dividend to its shareholders, after a double-digit growth in income and profit in 2017.

In 2017 HT posted a net profit of 841.3 million kuna (€113.5 million). The dividend will amount to 6 kuna per share, while the remaining 351.2 million kuna (€47.4 million) will go into retained earnings.

The company’s total income in 2017 was 7.76 billion kuna, or 11 percent compared to 2016, and operating profit was 3.1 billion kuna, or 11.2 percent up from 2016.

HT, which is 51 percent owned by Deutsche Telekom, is the largest telecom operator in Croatia and has recently started investing beyond the country’s borders, acquiring a 76.5 percent stake in Crnogorski Telekom in Montenegro in early 2017 for €123.5 million euros.

(€1 = 7.41 kuna)

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