PCCW - Zahlen ????????????? - 500 Beiträge pro Seite

[asiate]

Hey

gestern sollten die Zahlen kommen. Bei Boersenreport war zu lesen, dass sie besser ausgefallen sind als erwarten + 6 % in HK. Mehr war nicht zu lesen. Hat irgend wer etwas näheres ? asiainternet - heute überhaupt keine Meldungen, em-research dort funzt es heute gar nicht und Inside ist auch nicht zu entlocken.
Bis dann

[GoldVogel]

HONG KONG (CBS.MW) -- Defying the Hang Seng`s broad-based 2.6 percent sell-off Friday,
shares of Pacific Century CyberWorks -- the Hong Kong index`s worst performing component
this year -- jumped 4.7 percent to HK$1.79 on slightly better-than-expected earnings in the half
year through June.

PCCW (PCW: news, chart, profile)
(HK:0008: news, chart, profile), Hong
Kong`s dominant telecommunications
company, reported after the market had
closed Thursday a net profit of HK$935
million ($120 million), thanks to
cost-cutting efforts as well as robust
revenue growth in data and broadband
Internet connections, which offset declining
revenue from international phone calls.

Apples and oranges

In the same period a year ago, PCCW lost
HK$35 billion. But that`s when it was an
Internet-multimedia company that liked to
think of itself in a league with AOL Time
Warner (AOL: news, chart, profile).

Like AOL, it used its high-flying stock to announce a huge acquisition in early 2000, but there the
similarity ends. The $28.5 billion takeover completed last August of Cable & Wireless HKT, Hong
Kong`s former telecom monopoly, set in train a morphing of PCCW that was accelerated by the burst
bubble in high-tech shares.

PCCW has drastically scaled back its Internet ambitions. Its January-June results as a telecom
heavyweight with $5 billion in net debt are very difficult to compare meaningfully with the business
results that 30-something chairman Richard Li`s vehicle posted in the first half of 2000.

EBITDA growth

Goldman Sachs analysts, less surprised than most by PCCW`s latest performance, said earnings
before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) was the high point of the results. EBITDA
margin for the group came in at 35 percent -- 5 percentage points above both the Goldman`s forecast
and PCCW`s margin in 2000, the U.S. investment bank said.

"We have made mostly minor changes to our earnings model, the most significant being an increase to
our core EBITDA estimates in 2001-2003 by around 6-10 percent," Goldman said in a note to clients.

"We are accordingly raising our adjusted EBITDA forecasts 5.5 percent in 2001 to HK$9.4 billion, 6.8
percent in 2002 to HK$10.4 billion, and 4.7 percent in 2003 to HK$11.2 billion."

On those assumptions, PCCW shares are trading on a multiple of 8.9 times 2001 EBITDA and 8 times
next year`s -- premiums of 20 percent and 12 percent, respectively, to the average EBITDA multiples of
the Asian incumbent peer group, Goldman said.

Debt burden

PCCW saw a slight loss in market share in its local fixed-line business, to 92 percent as of June 30
from 94.6 percent at the end of last year. A hike in charges caused some customers to defect to
competitors; others disconnected their lines to switch to mobile phones or broadband connections.

David Prince, PCCW`s chief financial officer, said Hong Kong`s broadband subscriber lines in Hong
Kong rose 60 percent to 305,000. This includes lines that PCCW provides to other broadband-service
carriers.

Prince said the company`s interest expenses should be lower in the second half, as PCCW has repaid
and refinanced a bridge loan for the acquisition of C&W HKT. That`s another contrast with the original
C&W HKT: it had a consistent stream of interest income.

PCCW had cash balances of HK$12 billion as of June 30. The free cash flow it generates going forward,
a good part of it anyway, will go toward whittling down its $5 billion debt burden. Goldman Sachs thinks
a catalyst for the stock could be if PCCW disposes of all non-strategic property assets. PCCW has
around $500 million in property assets on its books.

Bill Clifford is Asia bureau chief of CBS.MarketWatch.com.

[tsgadler]

HONG KONG (CBS.MW) -- Defying the Hang Seng`s broad-based 2.6 percent sell-off Friday,
shares of Pacific Century CyberWorks -- the Hong Kong index`s worst performing component
this year -- jumped 4.7 percent to HK$1.79 on slightly better-than-expected earnings in the half
year through June.

PCCW (PCW: news, chart, profile)
(HK:0008: news, chart, profile), Hong
Kong`s dominant telecommunications
company, reported after the market had
closed Thursday a net profit of HK$935
million ($120 million), thanks to
cost-cutting efforts as well as robust
revenue growth in data and broadband
Internet connections, which offset declining
revenue from international phone calls.

Apples and oranges

In the same period a year ago, PCCW lost
HK$35 billion. But that`s when it was an
Internet-multimedia company that liked to
think of itself in a league with AOL Time
Warner (AOL: news, chart, profile).

Like AOL, it used its high-flying stock to announce a huge acquisition in early 2000, but there the
similarity ends. The $28.5 billion takeover completed last August of Cable & Wireless HKT, Hong
Kong`s former telecom monopoly, set in train a morphing of PCCW that was accelerated by the burst
bubble in high-tech shares.

PCCW has drastically scaled back its Internet ambitions. Its January-June results as a telecom
heavyweight with $5 billion in net debt are very difficult to compare meaningfully with the business
results that 30-something chairman Richard Li`s vehicle posted in the first half of 2000.

EBITDA growth

Goldman Sachs analysts, less surprised than most by PCCW`s latest performance, said earnings
before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) was the high point of the results. EBITDA
margin for the group came in at 35 percent -- 5 percentage points above both the Goldman`s forecast
and PCCW`s margin in 2000, the U.S. investment bank said.

"We have made mostly minor changes to our earnings model, the most significant being an increase to
our core EBITDA estimates in 2001-2003 by around 6-10 percent," Goldman said in a note to clients.

"We are accordingly raising our adjusted EBITDA forecasts 5.5 percent in 2001 to HK$9.4 billion, 6.8
percent in 2002 to HK$10.4 billion, and 4.7 percent in 2003 to HK$11.2 billion."

On those assumptions, PCCW shares are trading on a multiple of 8.9 times 2001 EBITDA and 8 times
next year`s -- premiums of 20 percent and 12 percent, respectively, to the average EBITDA multiples of
the Asian incumbent peer group, Goldman said.

Debt burden

PCCW saw a slight loss in market share in its local fixed-line business, to 92 percent as of June 30
from 94.6 percent at the end of last year. A hike in charges caused some customers to defect to
competitors; others disconnected their lines to switch to mobile phones or broadband connections.

David Prince, PCCW`s chief financial officer, said Hong Kong`s broadband subscriber lines in Hong
Kong rose 60 percent to 305,000. This includes lines that PCCW provides to other broadband-service
carriers.

Prince said the company`s interest expenses should be lower in the second half, as PCCW has repaid
and refinanced a bridge loan for the acquisition of C&W HKT. That`s another contrast with the original
C&W HKT: it had a consistent stream of interest income.

PCCW had cash balances of HK$12 billion as of June 30. The free cash flow it generates going forward,
a good part of it anyway, will go toward whittling down its $5 billion debt burden. Goldman Sachs thinks
a catalyst for the stock could be if PCCW disposes of all non-strategic property assets. PCCW has
around $500 million in property assets on its books.

Bill Clifford is Asia bureau chief of CBS.MarketWatch.com.