Kolkata: After reporting losses for six straight quarters, India’s No. 2 carrier Bharti Airtel<\/a> is likely to report a net profit in the October-December period -- unless there are unforeseen exceptional items -- boosted by the sustained recovery of its India mobile business, strong customer additions and a surge in 2G-to-4G user conversions, analysts said.
Bharti Airtel<\/a> and Reliance Jio<\/a> are likely to report sequential gains in mobile revenue and operating income in the fiscal third quarter, helped by continued 4G<\/a> subscriber additions and the fully captured impact of the December 2019 tariff hikes.
Loss-making Vodafone Idea, though, is likely to continue losing customers and report sequential dips in revenue and operating income in the December quarter, primarily hit by lower network-related capex spends that have shackled its ability to compete effectively with Airtel and Jio on the 4G turf.
Axis Capital estimates Sunil Mittal-led Airtel to report an Rs 81.3 crore net profit in the December quarter, helped by continuing average revenue per user (ARPU) growth momentum that is slated to boost the telco’s India wireless revenues by nearly 6% sequentially.
An analyst at a leading global brokerage, who did not wish to be named, said \"Airtel should return to the black in the third quarter, assuming there are no exceptionals such as regulatory costs or any accelerated write-offs towards network costs as in past quarters.\"
Nitin Soni, senior director at global ratings firm, Fitch<\/a>, expects Airtel to report sequential Ebitda and revenue growth as the telco’s market execution has been better than its nearest competitors, particularly in the last two quarters, helping grab more 4G customers than Jio.
“We expect Airtel to report decent ARPU growth in the third quarter with many more 2G users likely to go 4G, in turn, boosting data consumption, a scenario further helped by the revival in smartphone sales growth post the pandemic-induced disruptions.”
<\/p>Read also<\/h4>