Romanian Telecom Op Romtelecom Posts Operating Loss, Lower Rev In Q3 Over Austerity

Romanian telecom operator Romtelecom, owned by Greek OTE Group, registered operating loss of EUR13.9 million in the third quarter of 2010 and its revenues dropped by 6.5%, to EUR181.5 million, because of austerity measures and rising unemployment.

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"In the third quarter, the Romanian consumer environment was once again negatively impacted by decreasing household income, higher sales tax, and rising unemployment, as well as a higher than expected rate of inflation," OTE said in a report Thursday.

In the same period last year, Romtelecom has revenues of EUR194.2 million and an operating profit of EUR8 million.

Romtelecom general manager Yorgos Ioannidis said in a press release the operator will continue, throughout the rest of the year, to launch offers allowing clients to deal with the limitations of the economic crisis as such offers launched in summer have been well received.

The number of fixed telephony lines operate by the company decreased 6.3% from October 1, 2009 to September 30, 2010, to 2.632 million.

However, the number of subscribers to internet services has seen significant growth, from 764,708 to 947,379 (up 23.9%), as did the number of subscribers to satellite and broadband television services, from 831,043 to 1.003 million.

Romtelecom has thus exceeded one million clients for its television services.

In the first nine months of the year, Romtelecom's revenues decreased 7.5%, to EUR546.8 million, and operating loss stood at EUR52.1 million, in the same interval the previous year, the operator posted revenues of EUR591 million and operating profit of EUR20.3 million.

Costs of a voluntary layoff program the company is running stood at EUR23.7 million in the first nine months compared to EUR5.1 million in the same period in 2009.

OTE, owned by the Greek state and Germany's Deutsche Telekom, is also present in Romania through the local division of mobile operator Cosmote and the local chain of Germanos stores, which retail IT&C products.

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