Astro Q2 net profit almost doubled
Favourable currency movement drives down its finance cost
PETALING JAYA: Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd’s net profit nearly doubled to RM246.3mil in the second quarter ended July 31 despite flattish revenue, as favourable currency movement drives down its finance cost.
The group also said its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) margin improved by 9% as the proportion of content costs against revenue decreased.
“Margins and profits in the second quarter benefited from lower cost to serve and one-off savings arising from content secured on more favourable terms,” group chief executive officer Datuk Rohana Rozhan said in a statement yesterday.
Revenue was 0.6% lower at
RM1.42bil.
Rohana said the lower revenue was due to the end of a one-off sports channel sub-licensing, as well as marginally lower contribution from subscriptions and e-commerce.
“Going forward, the company expects revenue growth in the immediate term to be underpinned by e-commerce, advertising expenditure, production revenues and the NJOI package,” she said.
She added that the company would continue to leverage on new technologies to address a larger Asean market,
Astro will pay an interim dividend of three sen in the second quarter.
For the first six months of financial year 2018, Astro’s net profit was up by nearly 35% year-on-year (y-oy) to RM442.17mil, driven by the increase in EBITDA, decrease in depreciation of property, plant and equipment as well as the decrease in net finance costs.
The group’s revenue in the first half of the current financial year decreased by 1.62% y-o-y to RM2.75bil in contrast to RM2.79bil a year earlier.
Moving forward, the pay-TV operator is cautiously optimistic on its prospects for the rest of the financial year, considering the relatively subdued consumer sentiment.
Astro serves 5.3 million, or about 72% of Malaysian households. Rohana said its pay-TV churn rate saw a reduction during the quarter, with average revenue per user at RM100.8.
The company said its TV viewership share gained one additional percentage point and was now at 77%. Average viewing time increased to four hours daily.
Astro Radio leads with over 16 million listeners weekly across its nine radio brands.