News
U.S. telco added 442,000 retail postpaid mobile customers.
Verizon reported lower third-quarter revenue and earnings on Thursday, as mobile customer growth slowed significantly compared to last year.
The U.S. telco’s wireless business added 525,000 retail customers during the three months to 30 September. Postpaid additions accounted for 442,000 of that total, while prepaid additions made up the remaining 83,000.
In the same quarter a year ago, Verizon Wireless added 1.21 million customers, comprised of 1.29 million postpaid net additions, and a net loss of 80,000 prepaid customers.
Verizon ended Q3 with 113.68 million mobile customers in total, up from 110.76 million in the corresponding quarter of 2015.
Meanwhile, the company’s fixed broadband base has yet to fully recover from the strike earlier this year that delayed new line installations in certain markets. The number of broadband connections at the end of September stood at 7.04 million, down slightly from 7.07 million a year ago, but up sequentially from 7.01 million.
On the financial side, third-quarter operating revenue fell to $30.93 billion (€28.33 billion), down 6.7% from a year ago. When revenues from since-divested local landline assets are stripped out, total operating revenues declined 2.9%.
Operating income fell to $6.54 billion from $7.54 billion, and net profit attributable to Verizon declined to $3.62 billion from $4.04 billion.
"Verizon continues to deliver strong financial and operational results in highly competitive markets while positioning itself for future growth," said Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam, in a statement.
Nonetheless, Verizon’s share price was down by 2.44% at the time of writing, outpacing the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which was down by 0.32%.
