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PHILIPPINE Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) will
likely meet its core net income target this year and
exceed earlier estimates of mobile phone subscribers,
the chairman of the nation’s largest company by market
value said Wednesday.
On the
sidelines of the 33rd Philippine Business Conference and
Expo, PLDT chairman Manuel Pangilinan said the phone
giant will “definitely” hit its P34-billion core net
income target.
The PLDT
Group’s core business, he added, will be “quite good”
for the second semester.
“Yes,
definitely,” Pangilinan said when asked if the
P34-billion figure is achievable this year.
“We will
certainly be in excess of last year as we have reported
in the first half this year,” he added.
The
company earlier pegged a guidance core profit of P31.5
billion this year, or the same as last year’s. Since
then, numbers have been revised upwards to P33 billion
and ultimately to P34 billion based on current market
realities.
In the
first half of the year, the PLDT Group’s reported a
13-percent increase in core net income to P17.2 billion.
From
April to June, PLDT posted P8.76 billion in core profit,
with currency and derivative gains stripped out, from
P7.64 billion a year earlier.
Without
these gains, the group’s net income for the first six
months of the year would have been up by 11 percent to
P17 billion.
Partly
owned by Hong Kong’s First Pacific Co. Ltd. and Japan’s
NTT group, PLDT reported a net income of P8.43 billion
in the second quarter, compared to P6.73 billion a year
earlier.
PLDT’s
strong performance was mainly brought about by strong
revenues related to the May elections.
As of
end-June, PLDT’s market share stood at 57 percent with
27.1 million mobile phone subscribers. Units Smart
Communications Inc. and Piltel accounted for 19.1
million and eight million, respectively, of subscribers.
Wednesday, Pangilinan also said the PLDT Group will
likely have 29 to 30 million wireless subscribers for
the year.
“Originally, when we designed our budget last year we
had forecasted about 26 million subscribers by year-end
of 2007, from about 24 million by year-end 2006. But I
believe we should be between 29 to 30 million. So, its
higher than we have forecasted,” Pangilinan said.
As of
end-September, wireless subscribers grew by more than
one million to 28.5 million. In the third quarter of
2006, Smart and Piltel registered 22.9 million
subscribers.
PLDT
president Napoleon Nazareno earlier said the group could
sustain the revenue and cellular subscriber growth all
the way to the second half of the year.
“The
economy is doing well. Our promotional offerings
continue to push our subscriber takeup even after the
election period is over. So far, our July subscribers
are looking good,” he said last August. |
