Friday 29 Mar 2024
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KUALA LUMPUR (June 22): Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd saw its net profit in its first financial quarter ended April 30, 2021 (1QFY22) increase 91% year-on-year (y-o-y) to RM141.25 million from RM73.84 million.

In a bourse filing, the group also declared a dividend of 1.5 sen for FY22, which is payable on July 23. In contrast, it had declared a dividend of one sen in the corresponding quarter last financial year.

Earnings per share (EPS) rose to 2.71 sen from 1.42 sen as a result.

Meanwhile, its quarterly revenue increased by around 0.8% to RM1.06 billion, from RM1.05 billion in 1QFY21.

Its improved bottom line was thanks to the increase in its earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) by 13% y-o-y to RM374 million from RM330.2 million.

At the same time, its EBITDA margin improved by 3.8 percentage points to 35.2% in 1QFY22, from 31.4% a year prior.

The company said the higher EBITDA and EBITDA margin were due to lower content costs and impairment of receivables, offset by higher merchandise costs, marketing and distribution costs and licence, copyright and royalty fees, as a percentage of revenue.

In addition, lower net financing cost also boosted Astro's bottomline.

Meanwhile, the slight increase in revenue was attributable to higher advertising revenue, merchandise sales and others, offset by a decrease in subscription revenue.

However, on a quarter-on-quarter (q-o-q) basis, Astro saw its net profit declined by 15.84% from RM167.83 million amid lower EBITDA that was contributed by higher net finance costs q-o-q. Its latest quarterly revenue dipped from RM1.11 billion in 4QFY21.

EPS also fell from 3.22 sen.

In a separate statement, Astro chief executive officer (CEO) Henry Tan said the group’s FY22 promises to be an action-packed year.

“We continue to execute on our strategy and in June, we introduced two new streaming services: sooka featuring live sports and winning local content for millennials and Disney+ Hotstar with amazing content at an incredible value. Customers can look forward to more exciting additions as we push ahead with our ambition to be Malaysia’s #1 aggregator of the best streaming services.

“Our Ultra and Ulti Box, already in over 300,000 homes are giving customers a new viewing experience. Astro GO, enhanced with ‘pre-access’ and ‘download’ features, has 1.4 million monthly active users with an average weekly viewing time of 213 minutes, while On Demand videos streamed tripled to 100 million. Our broadband base grew around 80% y-o-y, as more customers bundled broadband with their content packages for convenience and value,” said Tan.

Meanwhile, Astro chairman Tun Zaki Azmi stated that Astro has posted a strong recovery in 1QFY22 amid the reimposition of lockdown measures, noting that the group continues to be cash generative, cost disciplined and proactive in its capital management.

On its outlook, Astro said the operating environment remains challenging amid nationwide lockdowns, even as Malaysia rolls out its vaccination programme.

Prolonged lockdowns may impact Astro’s revenue, in particular advertising and enterprise revenue, it added. It noted that it will continue to optimise cost and actively manage its capital to further strengthen its balance sheet.

Shares in Astro closed 5.93% or seven sen higher at RM1.25, valuing it at RM6.52 billion. It saw 13.98 million shares done.

Edited ByLam Jian Wyn
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