MANILA, The Philippines-Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) is expected to post continued gains for the second quarter of the year amid the slowdown in growth of both the wireless and wireline businesses, according to a report from financial service company Morgan Stanley.
The company is seen to register earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of 57 percent, slightly lower than its EBITDA margin of 58 percent for the first quarter of the year, the report noted.
Like in the first quarter, PLDT will stand to benefit for the rest of the year from its wireless subsidiary Smart Communications and affiliate Pilipino Telephone Corporation (Piltel).
During the first three months, Smart and Piltel recorded 608,000 new subscribers. Morgan Stanley projects that Smart and Piltel will have 115,300 new subscribers each month for the rest of the year and that Smart will post revenue growth of 35 percent to 40 percent year-on-year despite the slowdown in subscriber growth.
