Norway's Telenor to buy back shares, Q2 numbers in line

Telenor, the Norwegian mobile phone operator with over 150 million subscribers across Europe and Asia, will buy back 3 percent of its shares worth around 4.7 billion crowns, lifting its shareholder returns as profits rise.

Telenor, which has been struggling to overcome a major legal dispute in India, on Tuesday said it will buy back 46.8 million shares, which comes on top of its 7.9 billion crown dividend payout earlier this year.

The buyback will involve the government's stake, maintaining state ownership at 54 percent.

Telenor reported a 32 percent rise in second-quarter operating profit, in line with expectations, as its Nordic operations continued to perform well and Asian units improved. It stuck to full-year guidance.

In India, where it is at risk of losing its license in the wake of an industry-wide corruption probe, Telenor continued to rapidly expand its customer base, even as it maintained it may be forced to abandoned the market.

Rules for the new licensing round will not be known until the end of August and Telenor has said it would exit India if the licence price exceeded its self-imposed cap.

The Indian unit cut its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) loss in the quarter to 625 million crowns from 965 million a year earlier and Telenor said it aimed to reduce future risk by making the firm self- financed quicker than it had initially planned.

For the full year, Telenor continues to expect group-wide revenue excluding India to rise in excess of 4 percent, in line with its guidance from three months ago, and still sees its EBITDA margin in the 35 to 36 percent range.

In the second quarter, the group's operating profit rose 32 percent to 4.29 billion crowns, in line with expectations, on revenues that also met forecasts.