Fri, 18 May 2001

Telkom books 18.5% rise in net income

JAKARTA (JP): State-owned telecommunications company PT Telkom reported on Thursday an unaudited consolidated net income of Rp 891.3 billion (about US$81 million) for the first quarter of the year, an increase of 18.5 percent from the same period last year.

This resulted in an earnings per share of Rp 88.42, or Rp 1,768.5 per American Depository Share, the company said in a statement.

Total operating revenues during the first three months of the year increased 16.2 percent to Rp 2.6 trillion, while total operating expenses grew 19.1 percent to Rp 1.33 trillion. This resulted in a 13.2 percent increase in operating income to Rp 1.25 trillion.

As of March 31, 2001, Telkom recorded a total long-term debt of Rp 10.5 trillion, of which 41.7 percent was denominated in rupiah and 58.3 percent was denominated in foreign currencies.

The company said this was an improvement from last year's long-term debt, of which 49.8 percent was denominated in rupiah and the rest in foreign currencies.

Telkom spent Rp 198.4 billion on capital expenditures between January and March of this year, of which approximately Rp 118.5 billion went to infrastructure development.

In the first quarter of 2001, Telkom and its joint operation partners (KSOs) operated 6.8 million lines in service, comprising 3.7 million lines in service in Telkom's area and 3.1 million lines in service in the KSO regions.

Net additional lines in service between January and March this year were 107,191, a 1.5 percent increase compared to the net additional lines in service during the same period last year, the company said.

A total of 68,048 lines were added in Telkom's regions of Greater Jakarta and East Java, and 39,143 lines in the KSO regions.

Telkom reported that 39,510 subscribers canceled their lines during the first quarter of the year. Of this figure, 23,928 lines were in Telkom regions and 15,582 lines in the KSO regions.

Some 26.4 percent of the cancellations were business subscribers, 73.3 percent residential subscribers and 0.3 percent social subscribers.

In its first quarter report, Telkom said that during the general shareholders meeting on May 10, the company's plan for the distribution of its 2000 net income had been approved. According to the plan, 35 percent of the net income, or Rp 888.65 billion, will go toward dividends of Rp 88.16 per share, 5 percent will be allocated for provisions and 60 percent will be for investments.

An extraordinary shareholders meeting, held on the same day, approved the sale and purchase agreements with state-owned telecommunications company PT Indosat.

Regarding Telkom's KSO partner in West Java, PT AriaWest International, which filed for arbitration with the International Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday, the company said it was prepared to go to arbitration.

Telkom investor relations manager Setiawan Sulistyono said the company was ready with its defense, which he said would prove AriaWest was in the wrong.

"But I cannot disclose our defense to the press because it's company strategy," he said. (tnt)