Azernews.Az

By Bloomberg

OAO Mobile TeleSystems, Russia’s largest mobile-phone carrier, forecast slower sales growth and declining profitability after posting a 92 percent fall in fourth-quarter net income amid geopolitical tensions and a depreciating ruble.

Sales this year may rise 2 percent or more compared with 3.1 percent growth last year, the operator known as MTS said in a statement on Tuesday. Operating income before depreciation and amortization will be more than 40 percent of sales, compared with 43 percent in 2014, the company forecast.

Net income in the quarter fell to 1.6 billion rubles ($26 million) because of the weakening Russian currency and a freeze placed on the equivalent of 5.1 billion rubles in a Ukrainian bank that was declared insolvent by local authorities.

Controlled by Russian billionaire Vladimir Evtushenkov, MTS’s forecasts of lower growth echoed pessimistic predictions from rivals OAO MegaFon and VimpelCom Ltd. VimpelCom said last month it forecast zero growth or even a “single-digit decline” in 2015 revenue. Billionaire Alisher Usmanov’s MegaFon expects revenue to be unchanged this year.

Growth in MTS’s Russian data-traffic revenue, its main growth driver recently, slowed to 27 percent last quarter from 37 percent in the third quarter. Fourth-quarter sales rose 2.3 percent to 107.2 billion rubles.