Petrochemicals and metals company Industries Qatar (IQ) posted a 6 percent drop in fourth-quarter net profit on Monday, citing lower global fertiliser prices, but boosted its divident payout.

The Gulf's second-largest chemical producer by market value, behind Saudi Basic Industries (Sabic), made a net profit of 1.673 billion riyals ($459 million) in the quarter, Reuters calculated based on its financial statements, compared with 1.784 billion riyals a year earlier.

Analysts polled by Reuters had on average expected the company to post a quarterly profit of 1.989 billion riyals.

IQ's full-year profit fell to 8.012 billion riyals in 2013, it said in a statement on Monday, from 8.441 billion riyals a year earlier, a decrease of 5 percent.

"Results...were adversely impacted by continued significant fertiliser price deflation, in line with international trends, and heightened fertiliser operating costs following increases in natural gas rates under the supply and purchase agreement with Qatar Petroleum," the firm quoted its chief coordinator Abdulrahman Ahmad Al-Shaibi as saying.

However, IQ's board decided to distribute a dividend of 11 riyals per share or 110 percent of its nominal value, up from 8.5 riyals per share for 2012.

"Based on the group's Feb. 16, 2014 average closing price on the Qatar Exchange, this is equivalent to a dividend yield of 6.1 percent," it said.  - Reuters