By Cassandra Garrison
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -Mexican telecommunications giant America Movil on Tuesday reported a 16% dip in third-quarter net profit compared to the year earlier period as the peso currency weakened versus the U.S. dollar, falling short of some analyst expectations.
The company, which is controlled by the family of Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, posted net profit of 15.8 billion pesos ($766 million), compared with 18.9 billion pesos a year earlier, in part due to the depreciation of the peso.
Net profit was below the estimates of Itau BBA for 21.3 billion pesos and Barclays for 23.48 billion pesos.
Local bank Banorte, however, predicted a steeper drop to 12.03 billion pesos due to the foreign exchange losses.
America Movil’s revenue dipped to 253.4 billion pesos from 260.2 billion pesos during the year-ago quarter. That still beat the Refinitiv forecast of 244.32 billion pesos.
EBITDA was 87.6 billion pesos, an increase of about 1% in nominal terms from a year ago.
“The EBITDA margin increased 1.3 percentage points to 34.6% and was our highest EBITDA margin in nine years,” the company said in its filing with the Mexican stock exchange.
America Movil said it added 4.2 million wireless subscribers in the quarter, including 2.2 million postpaid customers. The company also reported 252,000 new broadband additions.
Shareholders last month overwhelmingly approved the company’s plan to spin off its towers business in Latin America.
America Movil and Liberty Latin America announced in September they would combine Chilean operations to form a joint venture. The two companies also reached a deal in which America Movil would sell its Claro Panama unit to Cable & Wireless Panama, a unit of Liberty Latin America.
Both deals excluded America Movil’s telecoms towers in Chile and Panama.
($1= 20.642 pesos at end-September)
(Reporting by Cassandra Garrison and Noe Torres in Mexico CityAdditional reporting by Jake Kincaid in Mexico CityEditing by Richard Pullin, Matthew Lewis and Cynthia Osterman)
