Orange reported a second consecutive year of revenue and adjusted EBITDA growth in 2017 and increased its operating cash flow for the first time since 2009. The company forecast a stronger growth rate in 2018 and said it would increase its dividend to 70 cents per share from 65 cents for 2017.
Annual revenues rose 0.4 percent to EUR 41.096 billion, equal to an increase of 1.4 percent on a comparable basis. In France, revenue grew for the first time since 2009, up 0.6 percent; Spain achieved record growth of 7.1 percent; and the operations in Africa and the Middle East accelerated revenue growth accelerated to 3.0 percent on a comparable basis.
Adjusted EBITDA was up 1.1 percent, or 2.2 percent on a comparable basis, to EUR 12.819 billion. The net profit from continuing operators doubled to EUR 2.114 billion from EUR 1.010 billion in 2016.
Operating cash flow rose 0.8 percent on a comparable basis to EUR 5.610 billion, but was still down 1.8 percent on a reported basis. Orange increased capex 3.4 percent last year to EUR 7.209 billion and confirmed this will rise further to EUR 7.4 billion in 2018, before falling in subsequent years.
For 2018, Orange said it expects adjusted EBITDA to grow at a faster rate on a comparable basis than the 1.4 percent achieved in 2017. Operating cash flow should also increase more than the 0.8 percent underlying growth last year. Both metrics should grow further in 2019 and 2020, the company said.
The dividend for 2018 is planned to increase to EUR 0.70 per share, after an unchanged payment of EUR 0.65 per share for 2017. Orange said the extra 5 cents would be reflected already in the interim dividend paid in December 2018.
Q4 results improve
For the fourth quarter of 2017, Orange saw its results improve compared to Q3. Sales growth returned, at 0.3 percent to EUR 10.546 billion, thanks to strong growth of 1.7 percent in France and 6.1 percent in central Europe. Adjusted EBITDA increased 1.5 percent to EUR 3.220 billion, and the margin improved to 30.7 percent from 30.4 a year earlier.
Orange ended the year with 211.4 million mobile customers, up 5 percent year-on-year on a comparable basis. Postpaid customers increased 7.2 percent to 74.6 million, and the number of 4G users reached 46.2 million. In the fixed market, the broadband base rose 4.7 percent in 2017 to 19.5 million, including 43 percent growth in fibre customers to 4.7 million.
Some 10.3 million customers were on fixed-mobile convergent offers, up 11 percent from 2016, of which 6.0 million in France, 3.1 million in Spain and 1.0 million in Poland. The company's latest venture, Orange Bank had 55,000 accounts open at year-end, which Orange said is ahead of its targets.
