Brazilian telecom carrier Telefonica (MC:TEF) Brasil SA (NYSE:VIV) -- a subsidiary of Spanish telecom giant Telefonica SA (NYSE:TEF) – recently reported third-quarter 2016 results.
Third-quarter net income was approximately $293.4 million, up 9.6% year over year. Moreover, earnings per ADR (American Depository Receipt) were 17 cents, well below the Zacks Consensus Estimate of 23 cents.
Net operating revenues were around $3,293.5 million, up 9.7% year over year.
Total operating costs in the reported quarter were approximately $2,243 million, down 1.9% year over year. Quarterly EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization) was about $1,050.3 million, reflecting an increase of 8.8% year over year. EBITDA margin was 31.9% compared with 29.6% in the prior-year quarter.
Segment-wise Results
Mobile Business’ total revenue increased 2.7% year over year to approximately $1,983 million in the reported quarter.
As of Sep 30, 2016, the company’s total mobile subscriber base touched 73.4951 million (down 7.5% year over year). Post-paid subscriber count increased 6.8% year over year to 32.499 million, while the prepaid customer count fell 16.3% year over year to 40.996 million. M2M customer base was 4.778 million, up 16.2% year over year.
Fixed Line Business’ total revenue dropped 1.4% year over year to approximately $1,110.3 million. Pay-TV revenues jumped 9.3% while broadband revenues decreased 10% year over year.
As of Sep 30, 2016, total fixed access lines were 23.707 million, reflecting a 2.3% year-over-year decrease. Fixed Broadband customers were 7.311 million, up 2.4% year over year. Internet and data access lines were 7.3218 million, up 1.8% year over year. The Pay-TV subscriber base declined 3.7% year over year to 1.762 million.
ARPU & Churn Rate
Quarterly data ARPU (average revenue per user) was up a substantial 35% to about $5.05 while quarterly voice revenue per user dropped 5.3% to around $3.51. Mobile ARPU was around $8.56, up 14.9% year over year. Mobile monthly churn rate was 3.4%, compared with 4.7% in the year-ago quarter. Postpaid monthly churn rate was 1.7% compared with 1.9% in the year-ago quarter.
Liquidity
Telefonica Brasil exited the third quarter of 2016 with cash and cash equivalents of around $1,789.3 million, up 8.6% from the end of 2015.
Zacks Rank
Telefonica Brasil currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Other similar ranked stocks worth considering in this sector include Juniper Networks, Inc. (NYSE:JNPR) and DragonWave Inc. (NASDAQ:DRWI) . Both the stocks have the same Zacks Rank as Telefonica Brasil. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
TELEF BRASIL SA Price, Consensus and EPS Surprise
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