Econet Wireless stock dips

revenue jumped almost 17 percent to US$339,5 million in the first six months.
While profit was only 5 percent up on the previous year, the overall performance remained good enough to retain bullish sentiment among investors, although the share took a few knocks.

Revenue grew US$339, 5 million, benefiting from the continued investment into the network, which saw mobile subscriber numbers grow by 24,4 percent to 7 million.
The company also maintained its dominance on the local market with a traffic market share of 72 percent.
EBITDA grew 16,4 percent to US$152,8 million registering an EBITDA margin of 44,8 percent, a reasonable 30 basis points lower than that in the first half.
Comet concluded the interim with earnings attributable to shareholders of US$78 million from US$73, 9 million and earnings per share of US 0,46c from US0,44c for the prior year comparative.

The company traded at US479c on Friday from US501c on Thursday, a day after it released its financials, showing marginal increase in profit but a modest rise in revenue. Losses in Econet and other blue-chip counters, namely Innscor and Colcom, dragged the main industrial index down by 1,2 percent to close Friday’s trading at 153,36 points.

Turnover came in at US$2,7 million, which was a significant improvement on the prior day’s trade, which saw US$1,8 million worth of shares changing hands.
Reasonable volumes were also traded in Dairibord, Edgars and Delta, which at US$1 022 million market capitalisation, has registered about 19 percent value increase in the value of the share on a year to date basis.

On Friday, the mining index also gained 1,63 percent to 90,27 after 2,4 percent increase in RioZim to US63,5c offset a 1,35 decline in Bindura Nickel Corporation, which closed the week’s trading at US2,95c.

Econet recovered slightly in opening week trades to change hands at US480 after putting on US0,01c on Monday.
In the opening week, trades the Econet’s share were bid at US475c, offered at US490c, but sold at US480c. The blue-chip stock price traded unchanged by the close of the afternoon trading session yesterday.

Econet, the second most capitalised counter on the ZSE, has registered 20 percent share price increase since January.
That gain put the company in second place in terms of market capitalisation after US$1,022 billion bellwether stock Delta.