Jun 2012 Financial News

TSTT’s profit jumps 85%

Jun 11, 2012

The after-tax profit of majority state-owned TSTT jumped by about 85 per cent between for the year ended March 31, 2012, compared with the local telecommunications provider’s results for the comparable period in 2011. This is according to an unofficial calculation done by the T&T Guardian of the annual results of Cable & Wireless Communications (CWC), the London-based company that owns 49 per cent of TSTT.

CWC attributed the US$6 million increase in its share of TSTT profits to “reduced staff costs.” The State’s 51 per cent stake in TSTT is held by National Enterprises Ltd (NEL) and the results of the telecommunications provider are consolidated in NEL’s results. The CWC results indicate that its share of TSTT’s results went from US$7 million for the year ended March 31, 2011 to US$13 million for the year ended March 31, 2012.

While TSTT’s revenue was down by 1.3 per cent to US$229 million for the 2011-2012 year, the number of its active mobile subscribers showed an increase of 2.1 per cent to 896,000. Active subscribers are defined as those having performed a revenue-generating activity in the previous 60 days.

While the growth in TSTT’s mobile subscribers was modest, the company reported a sharp increase in the number of its broadband subscribers with the number jumping by 20.5 per cent from 93,000 in the 12 months ending March 31, 2011 to 112,000 for the comparable period ending in March 31, 2012.

Asked by a London-based financial analyst at an analysts’ meeting webcast on May 24 to provide an update on discussions that CWC has had with regard to its stake in TSTT, CWC’s chief financial office, Tim Pennington, said: “We continue to maintain our policy on associates that unless we control the capital we have invested, we are better off putting it somewhere else.

“In Trinidad,it’s a particularly difficult market.There is certainly a dialogue that’s taking place at the present time as to the right form of ownership for TSTT. I’m not sure that that is a dialogue which will achieve a quick or easy end. But it’s something that we are pushing hard with the Government there and we’ll see how it goes.”


Source:
Trinidad Guardian
Monday June 11, 2012

http://www.guardian.co.tt/business/2012-06-11/tstt%E2%80%99s-profit-jumps-85