Vodafone could return to organic growth this quarter, says UBS

UBS has reiterated its 'buy' rating on Vodafone after the telecoms stocks after the group showed that its turnaround had continued in the third quarter.The bank kept a 265p target price for the stock, which remains one of its "preferred picks" in the sector.Organic service revenues in the three months to 31 December 2014 fell by just 0.4% after the 4.2% and 1.5% declines seen in the first and second quarters, respectively."We think VOD is on track to return to positive growth in Q4," said UBS analysts Polo Tang and Michael Hill."The underlying trends are improving faster than the market expects - we think this reflects the benefits of Project Spring investment that has led to improved network quality/better net adds and accelerated growth in data," they said.They said that Vodafone's valuation remains "cheap", particularly given its 5% dividend yield, and they expect the shares to continue to re-rate as top-line trends improve.Tang and Hill see "scope for VOD to benefit from ongoing market repair across Europe and upside from mobile data".Despite the positive comments, markets gave a largely negative reaction to the third-quarter update on Thursday, with the stock extending losses on Friday morning, down 0.7% at 229.39p.