On the back of exceptional gains of Rs 1,152 crore, Bharti Airtel on Wednesday swung back into the black just after six quarters, posting a net profit of Rs 854 crore, far ahead of Bloomberg consensus estimates of Rs 158.98 crore.
The company’s net loss just before the exceptional gains is Rs 298 crore. The Bharti board also gave an in-principle nod for raising of funds of up to Rs 7,500 crore through debt as when acceptable.
Bharti maintained its surge on typical income per user (Arpu) and information usage per buyer, beating rival Reliance Jio. The subscriber addition, for the duration of the quarter, which includes that of 4G customers, continued to be powerful.
Bharti beat estimates on the income and operating profit front also. Consolidated income for the duration of the period improved 5.8% sequentially at Rs 26,518 crore though Ebitda at Rs 12,178 crore was 8.2% greater than the preceding quarter. Ebitda margin stood at 45.9% compared to 44.9% in the preceding quarter.
The country’s second most significant telco had posted a net loss of Rs 763 crore in the preceding quarter.
Bharti created an exceptional achieve of Rs 4,559.9 crore in Q3FY21 comprising a charge on account of reassessment of contractual/regulatory levies and taxes of Rs 3,159.6 crore and a charge on account of the reassessment of the beneficial life of particular categories of network assets due to technological advancements and impairment of intangible assets of Rs 1,419.5 crore.
India revenues at Rs 19,007 crore was up 1.34% compared with the preceding quarter though India mobile revenues saw a jump of 6.85% at Rs 14,779 crore.
The business continued to strengthen its Apru which at Rs 166, apart from beating estimates, was 2.4% greater than the preceding quarter. Minutes of voice usage per buyer per month enhanced 2.2% quarter-on-quarter at 1,027 minutes. Data usage per buyer per month was up 2.2% sequentially at 16,766 MB, the strongest in the sector. Total information volume saw a jump of 10.7% q-o-q at 8,453,706 million MB.
The month-to-month churn, although, has improved to 1.9% against 1.7% in the preceding quarter. This could be due to low-paying 2G customers leaving the network.
Of the company’s total 308 million subscribers, 165 million are now 4G customers. The 4G subscriber addition saw a 8.5% jump on a sequential basis.
“Despite the unprecedented volatility that we have confronted through the year, we delivered another strong performance this quarter. This consistency in performance was across every part of our portfolio, as reflected in market share growth across all our business segments. The main highlight of the quarter was the 13 million 4G customers we added in our wireless business. As a result, we grew our revenues by 25% over the same period last year and margins expanded,” Gopal Vittal, MD and CEO, India and South Asia, mentioned.