Dubai: Vodafone Qatar, an affiliate of Vodafone Group, blamed stiff competition as it reported a widening first-quarter loss on Thursday that missed analyst estimates.
Vodafone, which has yet to make a quarterly net profit since it ended state-controlled Ooredoo’s domestic monopoly in 2009, made a net loss of 99.9 million riyals ($27.4 million) in the three months to June 30, it said in a statement.
That compares with a loss of 27.4 million riyals in the prior-year period and the operator has now made widening losses for three successive quarters, Reuters data shows.
Vodafone Qatar’s financial year starts on April 1.
Analysts had on average forecast Vodafone Qatar would make a quarterly loss of 56.8 million riyals.
“The Qatari telecom market continues to face extremely competitive pressure on prices, which is impacting the company’s results in the short term,” Vodafone Qatar chairman Shaikh Dr Khalid Bin Thani Al Thani said in the statement.
The company, which is 23 per cent owned by parent Vodafone and 22 per cent by a Qatar government-linked fund, generated first-quarter revenue of 538 million riyals. This was down from 8 per cent from the prior-year period.
