Sri Lanka’s Dialog Axiata profit edges up to Rs2.3 bln in June quarter

Aug 09, 2017 (LBO) – Profits at Sri Lanka’s Dialog Axiata group, increased by 2.6 percent to 2.3 billion rupees in the June quarter, interim accounts showed. Dialog said their second quarter performance was impacted by externalities including the inclement weather and severe flood conditions during the month of May. The group which has interests in mobile, fixed and pay television, reported basic earnings of 29 cents per share for the quarter compared to 28 cents per share a year ago. Revenues grew 9.2 percent to 23.0 billion rupees in the quarter from a year earlier while direct costs rose at a faster 9.7 percent to 12.1 billion rupees with gross profits rose 8.8 percent to 10.9 billion rupees. Distribution and administrative costs rose 9.6 percent to 7.4 billion rupees in the quarter from a year earlier, while net finance costs rose 21.4 percent to 724 million rupees. Dialog said the growth was achieved on the back of concerted efforts to drive revenue growth and aggressive cost rescaling initiatives. In the six months to June, the group reported earnings of 48 cents per share on total profits of 3.9 billion rupees, down 19.9 percent against previous year. It was impacted by increase in depreciation, net finance cost and non-cash translational forex losses, Dialog said. In segmental analysis, mobile operation reported 5.8 billion rupees profit while fixed telephony and broadband operation posted 872 million rupees for the period ended in June. Television operation recorded a loss of 353 million rupees. Dialog said consumer spending continued to be impacted by increased consumption taxes on communication services which moderated revenue growth across all segments. Dialog Broadband recently announced the launch of its commercial 4.5G TDD LTE network in Sri Lanka. The company also announced the first successful trial of next-generation, Massive MIMO (Multiple-Input Multiple-Output) Technology recently. Dialog said capital expenditure was directed in the main towards investments in high-speed broadband infrastructure to further strengthen its position in broadband sector. As at the end of June, 20,385 public shareholders were holding 16.68 percent of the total shareholding of the company.