RCom Q2 net profit down 77% to Rs 153 cr

Telecom operator Reliance Communications today reported 77 per cent decline in consolidated net profit to Rs 153 crore for second quarter ended September, mainly on account of a significantly high 'other income' in the year-ago period.
The company had reported net profit of Rs 675 crore in the same period of the last fiscal. That included one-time 'arrangement' of Rs 441 crore for provisional business restructuring.
Net profit during July-September period of the 2014-15 fiscal was, however, up by about 16 per cent on quarterly basis. The company had posted net profit of Rs 132 crore in the April-June period.

"This was a seasonally weak quarter but we had a satisfactory performance. Our PAT (profit after tax) was up by about 16 per cent on sequential quarter basis on account of reduction in finance cost and net debt," RCom CEO Gurdeep Singh told PTI.
The company's net debt during the September quarter reduced to Rs 36,334 crore, from Rs 40,223 crore in the June quarter of the current fiscal.
In second quarter of 2013-14, RCom had reassessed the requirement of maintaining balance of Rs 441 crore of provision for business restructuring created pursuant to the schemes of amalgamation approved by High Court in financial year 2006-07.

The amount was credited to other income, Singh said.

The total income of the company decline by about a per cent to Rs 5,287 crore in the second quarter of 2014-15, compared to Rs 5,361 crore in the year-ago period.
The income also declined on the same level on a quarter- on-quarter basis. In April-June period, RCom posted total income of Rs 5,354 crore.
RCom reported 75 per cent increase in data traffic year- on-year basis with average data used per customer at 752 MB. The company said it has 29.7 million using mobile Internet out of 15.1 million are its 3G service subscribers.

"We are having highest EBIDTA margin of 33.8 per cent in the industry and it has been improving on sequential quarter basis. We generated operational cash flow of Rs 1,827 crore in the second quarter and paid net finance charges of Rs 670 crore during the period. It remains free cash flow (FCF) positive and this is expected to continue," Singh said.
The minutes of usage of its services declined by 1 per cent on quarterly basis at 102.1 billion. However, RCom's revenue per minute was up by 1.4 per cent on Q-o-Q basis at 44.4 paisa and average revenue per user was up marginally at Rs 137.

The company invested Rs 302 crore on capex during the second quarter.
The RCom scrip closed at Rs 102.9, up 0.1 per cent, on the BSE.