Ayala-led Globe Telecom said its net income was almost flat at P14.5 billion in the first half of 2024, up by one percent from P14.4 billion in the same period last year.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE), the firm said, “This was primarily driven by the robust EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization) growth, which counterbalanced the rise in depreciation expenses for the period." 

Excluding the one-time gain from the tower sale, normalized net income would have stood at P11.9 billion, reflecting a 19 percent increase from the year earlier.

Excluding the effects of non-recurring charges, foreign exchange, and mark-to-market charges, Globe's core net income expanded by 18 percent year-on-year to P11.7 billion during the first half of 2024. 

On a comparable basis, assuming that ECPay had been deconsolidated from Globe's books during the first half of 2023, the core net income would have shown an even more robust growth of 21 percent.

Globe closed the first half of 2024 with consolidated gross service revenues of P82.2 billion, up two percent from a year ago, despite the decline in home broadband and non-telco services. 

Mobile revenues increased by seven percent, while corporate data revenues improved eight percent from the previous year. 

Globe's mobile business has shown resilient growth, with all-time high revenues of P58.4 billion as of June 2024, compared to P54.8 billion in the same period last year. 

This was fueled by Globe's effective market repair initiatives and sustained network quality, as evidenced by customers’ continued preference for Globe's products and services. 

In terms of product performance, mobile data revenues hit a record-breaking quarterly high of P24.2 billion, totaling P48 billion in the first half of the year.

This represents a nine percent growth compared to the previous peak of P44 billion achieved a year ago. 

The surge in mobile data revenues was largely attributed to Filipinos’ increasing reliance on mobile apps for various online activities such as e-commerce, media streaming, and social networking. The widespread availability of smartphones further propelled this revenue expansion.

On the other hand, traditional mobile voice and SMS revenues dropped two percent and six percent, respectively.

Corporate data revenues grew by eight percent year-on-year, generating P9.8 billion as of June of 2024. This was mainly due to the contributions from information and communication technology (ICT) and core data services which improved versus last year by nine percent and seven percent, respectively. 

In contrast, home broadband revenues dropped by six percent year-on-year, from P12.8 billion to P12.1 billion by the end of June 2024, due to lower fixed wireless services. 

Despite this decline, postpaid fiber showed steady expansion, accounting for 85 percent of home broadband revenues. The three percent increase in both postpaid fiber subscribers and revenues partially offset the overall decline in home broadband revenues.

Globe's non-telco revenues posted a significant decline, dropping by 58 percent year-on-year compared to the P2.8 billion reported at the end of June 2023.

This substantial decrease was primarily due to the deconsolidation of ECPay from Globe's books, following the sale of its 77 percent stake to Mynt in September 2023. 

However, if the deconsolidation of ECPay had been factored into Globe's records during the first half of 2023, total non-telco revenues would have been lower by only 26 percent.