EDP 9-mo net profit falls 20 percent, beats fcast

LISBON Oct 29 (Reuters) - Energias de Portugal (EDP.LS) posted on Thursday a 20 percent fall in nine-month net profit after a drop in power distribution and prices as well as a big one-off gain a year ago, but beat market forecasts.

Net profit reported by Portugal's main utility and largest company fell to 748 million euros ($1.10 billion) compared with 709 million euros average in a Reuters poll of 10 analysts.

EDP said that excluding nonrecurrent items, net profit rose 9 percent to 780 million euros.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) edged up 2 percent to 2.43 billion euros. Analysts polled by Reuters had forecast, on average, EBITDA of around 2.39 billion euros. (Reporting by Sergio Goncalves, writing by Andrei Khalip)