Telefónica reported strong 2007 financial results driven by an expanding customer base (+12.5%), revenues (+6.7%), OIBDA (+19.3%), OI (+42.1%) and net profit (+42.9%), all up compared with 2006. Telefónica had a total of 228 million accesses, of which 169 million were wireless telephony accesses and 10.2 million retail broadband accesses.
Telefónica has also improved its shareholder remuneration policy and launched a new share buyback program for 100 million shares up to first half of 2009. This will be complemented by a dividend payment of 1 euro per share charged against 2008 earnings.
Some highlights:
- Telefónica España has 46.4 million accesses, an increase of 5% on 2006, underpinned by growth in wireless and broadband customers.
- Telefónica Latinoamérica has 134.1 million accesses, up +16.9% year-on-year thanks to the strong growth in broadband, a robust wireless market, which registered a new record for net adds in the fourth quarter, and an expanding Pay TV customer base, which increases close to 75% compared with 2006.
- By access type, growth in mobile accesses at the Telefónica Group accelerated to 16.6% year-on-year to 169.2 million.
- Retail Internet broadband accesses at the Telefónica Group surged 28.9% year-on-year to over 10.2 million at the end of December. Take-up for ADSL, TV and voice bundles remained strong, making a significant contribution to developing the broadband market and forging customer loyalty. In Spain, retail broadband accesses surpassed 4.5 million (up +22.1% year-on-year), in Latin America, 5 million (+33.2%) and in Europe, 670,000 (+48.3%).
- Pay TV accesses at the end of the quarter exceeded 1.7 million, 64.3% more than in 2006, with operations up and running in Spain, the Czech Republic, Peru, Chile, Colombia and Brazil.
- CapEx in 2007 totaled 8,027 million euros, an increase of 0.3% year-on-year.
