Group profit rises 2.2% despite tough conditions and CEO claims transformation plan is working
Vodafone Group reported its annual results broadly in line with expectations, posting core earnings of €11.02 billion from revenues of €36.7 billion. The group’s service revenue dropped 1.3 percent, but on an organic basis, increased by 6.3%, with opcos in Europe and Africa, and its Business division all growing. With the exception of Turkey, the Group had service revenue growth of 3.7% (to €29.9 billion) on an organic basis. (Our analysis of Vodafone Group’s results in other regions can be found here.)
The operator group announced that total revenue in Africa declined by 8.1% to €7.4 billion due to the depreciation of local currencies against the euro. Hence service revenue decreased by 9.2% but organic growth in service revenue grew by 9.2%, with growth in South Africa, Egypt and Vodacom’s international markets.
In South Africa, service revenue growth was supported by consumers taking up contracts for mobile and price rises to those contracts in the first quarter. Also there was good fixed line growth in Consumer and Business. Growth slowed in Q4 due to a strong prior year comparative, reflecting an acceleration in customer data usage during widespread power outages, and pressure on wholesale revenue. Financial services revenue grew by 7.9% to €156.9 million on an organic basis, supported by growth in our insurance services.
Service revenue in Egypt grew strongly during the year and accelerated in Q4, above inflation. The acceleration was supported by sustained customer base growth, price increases in mobile and fixed, robust demand for data and strong growth in our financial services product, ‘Vodafone Cash’. Vodafone Cash revenue more than doubled in FY24 to €95.8 million.
In Vodacom’s international markets, service revenue growth was supported by a higher customer base and strong M-Pesa and data revenue growth. M-Pesa revenue grew by 13.4% on an organic basis and now represents 26.8% of service revenue.
Adjusted EBITDAaL declined by 11.8% during the year. On an organic basis, adjusted EBITDAaL increased by 6.4%, supported by service revenue growth and cost initiatives, partially offset by an increase in technology operating expenses associated with higher energy costs. The Adjusted EBITDAaL margin decreased by 1.5 percentage points year-on-year (organic: -1.1 percentage points) to 34.2%.
Customers
In South Africa, Vodafone added 125,000 contract customers in the year, and now has a mobile contract base of 6.8 million. It added 5.7 million mobile prepaid SIMs in the year, supported by our big data led customer value management capabilities which offer personalised bundles to customers. Across its active customer base, 81.5% of mobile customers now use data services, an increase of 3.3 million year-on-year. The VodaPay super-app continued to gain traction with 5.8 million registered users.
In Egypt, Vodafone added 437,000 contract customers and 2.4 million prepaid mobile customers during the year, bringing the total to 48.3 million customers. ‘Vodafone Cash’ now has 8.2 million active users with 2.8 million users added during the year.
In Vodacom’s international markets, the operator added 4 million mobile customers and its mobile customer base is now 54.2 million, with 63.5% of active customers using data services.
Source link : https://www.mobileeurope.co.uk/vodafone-rises-in-africa-despite-currency-falls/
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Publish date : 2024-05-14 07:00:00
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