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Several research houses downgraded their price target for BT Group Plc's (LSE: BT.A) stock price over next twelve months, post-fixed-line telecommunication's results declared last week, but they are impressed with the Philip Jansen, the new chief of the group.
On May 09, 2019, the fixed line telecom giant reported its full year financial results for the period ended March 31, 2019. During the FY19, the group's reported revenue as well as adjusted revenue declined by 1 per cent against the previous financial year and stood at £23,428 mn and £23,459 mn respectively. However, on a reported basis, pre-tax profit improved by 2 per cent to £2,666 mn and post-tax profit on a reported basis surged by 6 per cent to £2,159 mn.
Flat revenue growth was accounted as a result of regulated price reduction in Openreach and reduction in their enterprise businesses, mainly in fixed line. However, decent growth in the consumer business segment partly offset the impact of other businesses.
Net cash generated from operating activities has plummeted 14 per cent to £4,256 mn, mainly because of pension deficit payments, and expanded capital expenditure and weak EBITDA. Capital expenditure heightened by £441 mn to £3,963 mn, out of which £213 mn related to BDUK grand funding and rest on account of the increased expenditure in FTTP.
Adjusted Net Debt as on March 31, 2019, surged by 15 per cent to £11,035 mn against the adjusted net debt of £9,627 mn as on March 31, 2018. For the full year to March 31, 2019, on an adjusted basis, revenue from Consumer business segment boosted by 3 per cent to £10,695 mn, on the other side, revenue from the Enterprise businesses plunged by 5 per cent to £6,292 mn, Global Services segment reported a fall of 6 per cent to £4,735 mn, and Openreach business segment snapped 4 per cent lower at £5,075 mn respectively.
The group proposed a final dividend of 10.78 pence per share and including the final dividend, the group's full-year dividend remained unchanged for FY19 at 15.4 pence per share.
Meanwhile, Barclays reduced 2021 target dividend per share by 33 per cent and reduced the price target to GBX 240/share from GBX 250/share. Elsewhere, Goldman readjusted its target to GBX 290 from GBX 300 earlier, and HSBC also cut its target from GBX 280 to GBX 270 respectively.
Shares of BT Group were witnessing a decline since several research houses reduced their twelve months target price for the stock. At the time of writing, (as on May 13, 2019), shares of the telecom global giant were quoting at GBX 204.35 and declined by 4.45 points or 2.13 per cent against the previous closing level. In the past one year, shares have registered a 52w high price of GBX 268.60 and a 52w low price of GBX 194.74, and at the current levels, as quoted above, shares were trading considerably below the 52w high price level. The group has a dividend yield of around 7.38 per cent which was substantially higher than the broader Index FTSE 100 dividend yield. Total outstanding market capitalization stood at around GBP 20.72 billion.
