Globe Telecom Inc. on Wednesday reported a 29 percent drop in net income last year to P24.6 billion from P34.60 billion in 2022.
The Ayala-led telco blamed the decline to higher depreciation expense and the absence of one-time gain from the partial sale of Globe’s data center business booked in the first quarter of 2022.
Excluding the impact of one-time gains, normalized net income would have been P19.1 billion, down 4 percent from 2022.
Globe’s core net income, which excludes the impact of non-recurring charges, one-time gain, foreign exchange gains and mark-to-market charges, stood at P18.9 billion, slightly down 1 percent year-on-year.
“Globe reached new heights in 2023 despite the lingering macroeconomic challenges and competition. Our non-telco businesses contributed more this year whether on the revenue line or in the equity earnings line, fueling our momentum going into the new year,” Ernest Cu, Globe president and chief executive, said.
Globe’s consolidated service revenue grew 3 percent to P162.3 billion from P158 billion last year, due to the outstanding performance of the mobile and corporate data business by robust growth from its non-telco services.
The company’s mobile business revenue posted a 5 percent increase to P112.4 billion from last year’s P107.5 billion, mostly coming from its prepaid brands.
Home broadband service revenue stood at P25.1 billion, down 7 percent from 2022, while corporate data revenue improved 7 percent to P18.31 billion.
Globe has set $1 billion in capital expenditures this year, lower from $1.3 billion capex in 2023. The reduced capex is traced to continued focus in optimizing capital deployment and bringing free cash flow to more sustainable levels.
The company invested P70.6 billion in capex last year or 30 percent lower than in 2022.
Last year, Globe built 1,217 new cell sites, upgraded close to 7,000 mobile sites to LTE and installed 849 new 5G sites nationwide.
Additionally, Globe deployed over 199,000 fiber-to-the-home lines in 2023 as the company continues to maximize the use of its existing fiber inventory and ensure the delivery of the right product to the underserved prepaid market.
