Telenor Profit Boosted by Emerging Asia

Norwegian telecom provider Telenor A/S (TEL.OS) on Thursday reported forecast-beating first-quarter net profit after seeing strong data consumption in emerging Asia.

Chief Executive Sigve Brekke said: "It has been a busy quarter, as we have introduced new and improved mobile offers in several markets, with encouraging customer reception. In Thailand and Malaysia, this supported double-digit postpaid growth, and we are actively working to mitigate the continued intense competition in the prepaid market."

Telenor said its net profit for the period slipped 2% to 4.17 billion Norwegian kroner ($481.7 million) from NOK4.26 billion a year earlier. First-quarter revenue fell to NOK30.46 billion from NOK31.49 billion a year earlier while the earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation margin rose to 37.6% from 36.9%.

Analysts polled by FactSet had expected net profit of NOK3.62 billion and revenue of NOK31.08 billion.

The company expects organic revenue growth of between 1% and 2% and an Ebitda margin of around 37%. The capex to sales ratio excluding licences is expected to be 15% to 16%.

Telenor, which is majority-owned by the Norwegian state, said it added 2.1 million new mobile subscribers to its networks, of which 1.9 million were in Bangladesh and 600,000 were in Pakistan, while Malaysia and Thailand saw slight declines. Total mobile subscriptions now total 172 million.

-Write to Dominic Chopping at dominic.chopping@wsj.com; Twitter: @domchopping @WSJNordics

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

May 04, 2017 04:01 ET (08:01 GMT)