Telstra's Chief Executive Officer Vicki Brady recaps our full year results ending 30 June 2024.
A message from our Chief Executive Officer Vicki Brady following the release of our full year results presented on 15 August 2024.
Vicki Brady:
Today, I'd like to share a summary of our financial performance for FY24 and outlook. I'm pleased to say that consistent and disciplined execution of our strategy has delivered our third consecutive year of underlying growth and positive momentum across many of our key indicators.
As a result, the board resolved to pay a fully franked final dividend of $0.09 per share, bringing total dividends for the year to $0.18, and representing a 5.9% increase compared to last year.
Underlying EBITDA is a key measure and it grew by almost $300 million, or 3.7%, to $8.2 billion. The underlying EBITDA growth flowed through to underlying net profit after tax, which grew by 7.5% to $2.3 billion.
Our mobile and infrastructure businesses, including Infraco Fixed, Amplitel and International, continue to perform strongly and comprised 96% of our underlying EBITDA. However, our enterprise business under-performed. We commenced action during the year to address challenges in our enterprise business, and took additional action on cost overall. Our reported earnings reflect these decisions and combined with other adjustments resulting significant one off net costs totalling $715 million.
As a result, reported EBITDA decreased by 4.2% to $7.5 billion and our reported net profit after tax reduced by 12.8% to $1.8 billion. The reset of our enterprise business will take time, but I am confident in the initial actions we have taken. These, together with our additional action on cost, meaning we are confident in achieving our $350 million cost reduction ambition by the end of FY25.
Overall, our T25 strategy is on track, including our growth ambitions in underlying EBITDA, EPS and ROIC.
Our guidance for FY25 demonstrates continued underlying EBITDA growth. And we have tightened our guidance range upwards to $8.5 to $8.7 billion. Over the last 12 months we've continued to deliver on our purpose by investing in vital infrastructure for the nation, supporting more customers than ever and supporting Australia's future prosperity.
This year, we have invested $5 billion in CapEx and mobile spectrum payments. Which brings us to $42 billion invested in CapEx and spectrum over the last ten years. That investment has radically transformed the connectivity Australia relies on. Our investment has delivered Australia's largest and most reliable mobile network, and we are continuing to roll out our inter-city fibre network, which will be an important part of future proofing Australia's speed and capacity needs for the next 20 years.
We also continue to expand our subsea cable network and we remain Australia's biggest investor in digital infrastructure.
Given the extensive reach of our networks and the role they play in society today, it's hard to think of an Australian who does not benefit from the Telstra network in some way every day. For example, our network supports more than 26 million mobile services and connectivity for more than 3 million households. More than 85% of the ASX100 are Telstra customers.
I am optimistic about the opportunities ahead. Our infrastructure and network will be increasingly central to how Australians live and work. And we are focussed on investing sustainably to deliver for our customers and our shareholders.
Thank you for your continued support and investment in Telstra.
Telstra's Chief Executive Officer Vicki Brady recaps our half year results ending 31 December 2023.
A message from our Chief Executive Officer Vicki Brady following the release of our half year results presented on 15 February 2024.
Vicki Brady:
Today I’d like to share a summary of our results for the six months ending 31 December 2023.
I’m pleased to say our results showed continued growth in reported and underlying earnings, with positive momentum across many of our key indicators.
As a result, the Board resolved to pay a fully franked interim dividend of 9.0 cents per share, which is a 5.9 per cent increase from last year.
These results reflect the great progress we have made in the second year delivering on our T25 strategy, which overall remains on track.
While our momentum is good, we have some parts of the business performing well, but there are others where we see challenges.
Our mobile business remains central to our growth and continues to perform strongly. This reflects our continued investment in network leadership and delivering connectivity that is reliable, resilient and secure.
Our Consumer & Small Business Fixed business more than doubled in EBITDA, and our Infrastructure businesses also grew, reflecting continued strong demand for our assets.
Within our Enterprise Fixed business, Data & Connectivity is performing as expected, but our Network Applications & Services business – or ‘NAS’ for short – was impacted by the acceleration of negative trends over the last few months.
We have a detailed review of our domestic Enterprise business underway and we’re taking immediate and significant actions to set the business up for success.
Given the performance in our NAS business, we tightened our FY24 Underlying EBITDA guidance range to $8.2 to $8.3 billion. FY24 guidance across other measures was reaffirmed.
We also remain disciplined on reducing our costs, particularly considering the external economic environment.
Delivering the second half of our T25 strategy and setting the business up strongly for beyond T25 remains a priority.
We continue to see the positive impact of product simplification and digitisation on customer experience. In the half, we have seen customer complaints reach new record lows and Episode NPS reach new record highs.
Our network leadership and resilience remains critical, and we continue to invest in cyber security, identity and scam protections, while uplifting productivity through the use of AI.
On satellite, we’re working with a range of LEO satellite providers to enhance our fixed, mobile and voice services for customers.
We’re also Australia’s biggest investor in digital infrastructure, and outside of Australia, we operate APAC’s largest subsea cable network.
We’re investing in foundational infrastructure for Australia and the region through our new Intercity Fibre network as well as additional subsea cables and satellite landing stations to support capacity demand for our customers.
I remain very confident about the important role we will play in a more digitised future and in our ability to continue to deliver sustainable growth, while also creating value for shareholders.
You can find more information about our results at our Investor Centre online.
Thank you for your continued support and investment in Telstra.
Telstra's Chief Financial Officer Michael Ackland speaks with Ally Selby from Livewire Markets on 11 October 2023 about Telstra's half year results and outlook. The interview is available below.
Telstra's Chief Financial Officer Michael Ackland speaks with Tom Piotrowski from CommSec on 11 October 2023 about Telstra’s structure, T25 strategy, long-term investments, FY24 guidance and its dividend. The interview is available below.
Telstra's Chief Financial Officer Michael Ackland presented virtually at the ASX CEO Connect event on 7 March 2023. The presentation is available below.
Our 2022 Retail Shareholder meeting was presented virtually by our Chief Executive Officer Vicki Brady and Chief Financial Officer Michael Ackland on 29 September 2022 at 10:30am AEST. The livestream is accessible below:
Our 2021 Retail Shareholder meeting was presented virtually by our Chief Executive Officer Andrew Penn and Chief Financial Officer Vicki Brady on 29 September 2021.