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(Alliance News) - BT Group PLC on Thursday said first quarter revenue slipped 3% from the same period last year, but the telecommunications firm remains optimistic it is "on a path to growth".
Revenue was GBP5.07 billion in the recent quarter, down 3.4% from GBP5.25 billion last year. Revenue grew in both its Consumer and Openreach units, but this was offset by declines in its Corporate and Public Sector segments.
Pretax profit fell by 4.5% to GBP536 million in the first quarter from GBP5.6 million in the same three months last year. However, adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation rose 2.9% to GBP1.87 billion from GBP1.81 billion.
Capital expenditure jumped by 63% to GBP1.51 billion in the recent quarter from GBP927 million a year ago. Net debt increased to GBP18.57 billion from GBP18.16 billion.
Shares in BT were down 6.7% at 171.54 pence in London on Thursday morning trade.
BT doesn't pay quarterly dividends, only interim and final installments. It had said back in May it expects to resume payouts at an annual rate of 7.7p per share in the current financial year.
"Our results were overall in line with our expectations during the quarter, with good performance in the UK offsetting challenging conditions in Global's markets," said Chief Executive Philip Jansen.
"We're powering ahead with our network build programmes: Openreach has now built full fibre broadband to more than 5m premises with growing customer demand; EE has set out plans for 5G on demand anywhere in the UK by 2028."
In addition, BT is strengthening its partnership with the US's Microsoft Corp - with whom it already has a portfolio of cybersecurity services - to accelerate co-innovation across the business, particularly in enterprise voice and cybersecurity.
By Josie O'Brien; josieobrien@alliancenews.com
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