BT profit climbs by 17pc despite tough trading
BT shrugged off difficult trading conditions in the wake of government cuts to match expectations in its first quarter.
The telecoms giant, which last month declared war on Sky with its entry into the lucrative Premier League subscription market, reported first quarter revenue of £5bn, down four per cent on the year before.
However, rigorous cost cutting pushed core earnings up six per cent to £1.4bn and profit before tax jumped 17 per cent to £446m.
It also paid off a portion of its mammoth debt pile, reducing it by £1.6bn to £8.9bn.
The £9bn blackhole in BT’s pension scheme has started to shrink, with the Pension Trust now estimating the deficit to be around £6.6bn.
The biggest surprise in the results came from the firm’s free cash-flow, which is usually down by around £100m during the first quarter but shot up to £437m.
Chief executive Ian Livingston called the results “acceptable”.
Early reports suggest the uptake of BT’s Premier League football package has been sluggish, despite the firm undercutting Sky.
BT continued to invest in its fibre cable network, which it said hit the 1.5m home milestone this quarter. It added 96,000 new broadband customers through BT Retail.