BT has released its first half-year results and confirms that it has met expectations, despite a fall in revenue. The slight fall was expected as large investments were made in 5G and gold standard fibre broadband.
The results
There were a few main takeaways from BT’s half-year results that are worth paying attention to. Revenue was down 2% at £11.4 billion ($14.7bn). This was mainly due to tougher regulation and strategic moves to fulfil lower margins.
EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization) is a great measure of a company’s operating performance. BT’s was down 3% at £3.9 billion ($5bn). This could be due to higher spectrum fees.
One key takeaway is that BT has maintained its healthy dividend yield of 7.6% which many investors will be happy to hear.
Investors were hoping for more
"Questions, that investors hoped would have been answered, still remain over how BT will fully finance 5G and full fibre rollouts."
Steve Miley, analyst at Ask Traders.
So, what do these results mean? Whilst BT is happy with them, we have seen shares drop 1% since the results were released. This could mean that maintaining the dividend wasn’t enough for investors, and they wanted more from the company.
"The fact that the stock is down indicates that investors were hoping for more," said Steve Miley, a senior market analyst at Ask Traders. “Savings from job cuts offset network investment. However, questions, that investors hoped would have been answered, still remain over how BT will fully finance 5G and full fibre rollouts. These were not a bad set of results, by any means, but this lack of clarity is weighing on the share price.”
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