Johannesburg - MTN on Thursday warned that it would adopt a cautious
attitude despite wanting to finalise its listing on the Nigerian stock exchange.
The company said it was concerned about regulatory hurdles and macro issues that prompted it to tread carefully ahead of its listing.
“There are some spectrum issues which the regulators needed to resolve,” executive chairman, Phuthuma Nhleko, said after the company released its results for the year to December.
MTN agreed to list on the Nigerian bourse as part of the settlement of the $1 billion (R13.08 billon) fine for missing a deadline to disconnect unregistered subscribers.
Nhleko said it would be irresponsible for the company to issue a prospectus unless the issues were resolved. He said the listing was a composite issue that the company wanted to finalise soon “but we really do need to resolve and tick those boxes”.
Nhleko described the 2016 financial year as the most challenging year in the company’s 22-year history. He described the Nigerian fine as a “seminal event” which included the withdrawal of regulatory services in Nigeria. “Without the operations being serviced, it is very difficult to put a number of products into the market competitively,” said Nhleko.
He said weaker currencies in the markets in which the group operated impacted on the revenue generated. “We are in difficult markets. But we believe that the recent disruptions in the emerging markets in which we operate will taper down. We are still well positioned being the largest operator in these markets,” said Nhleko.
Read also: MTN delivers first ever loss
He said the group was proceeding with plans to repatriate about $1bn from Iran. “I am happy to say that we are almost there. We have, all in all, repatriated almost e900m (R12.42 billion).”
MTN has been trying to repatriate the money from 49 percent-owned venture MTN IranCell Telecommunication Company Services after the easing of sanctions against Iran.
Nhleko gave details of MTN’s Project Ignite, which he said was a transformative project “to hit the reset button on a number of operational and strategic matters”. A company as big as MTN with an extensive network needed to be on the cutting edge of trends. “This sector is changing. Some of these operations in the next year or two are going to become more data companies than voice companies,” he said.
MTN’s revenue rose marginally by 0.4 percent with the company attributing this to the depreciation of the rand and naira against the dollar.
Group subscribers rose 3.3 percent to R240.4 million. Data revenue rose 16.7 percent, while voice traffic fell 1.7 percent.
The company reported a headline loss of 77 cents a share, mainly because of the Nigerian fine. It declared a second-half dividend of R4.50 a share, taking the final dividend for the year to R7 a share.
Shares closed 8.32 percent higher at R126.75.