After seven long years, Telstra has finally lifted shareholder dividend
Telstra has raised its total dividend for the first time since 2015, returning $1.9 billion to shareholders following what chief executive Andy Penn says has been the successful transformation of the company.
Telstra earned saw its total income drop 4.7 per cent to $22 billion in the 12 months to June 30, compared to the previous year where Telstra benefited from some one-off M&A activity. Net profit after tax was down 4.6 per cent to $1.8 billion.
But its underlying earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) was up 8.4 per cent to $7.3 billion and free cashflow rose 5.9 per cent to $4 billion.
Telstra predicted EBITDA would rise to $7.8 billion to $8 billion this financial year, on total income of $23 billion to $25 billion.
Penn said Telstra set out four years ago with its T22 strategy to “fundamentally transform the company, to simplify and digitise, to set bold aspirations and radical interventions and that is what we have done.”
Telstra will pay a fully-franked final dividend of 8.5 cents per share, from 8c a year ago.
