Sprint on Tuesday announced its consolidated financial results for the second quarter of the year, managing to post its first net income in three years over the three-month period ending June 30. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) amounted to $2.9 billion in Q2 2017, a notable increase compared to the $2.5 billion posted in the second quarter of last year. The fourth largest wireless carrier in the United States managed to translate that figure to $206 million in net profit, with the firm’s Chief Executive Officer Marcelo Claure claiming that the achievement marks a major milestone for the struggling telecom giant that’s meant to signal Sprint is turning things around.
The Overland Park, Kansas-based mobile service provider managed to add 35,000 prepaid phones and 88,000 postpaid customers over the same period, with its total net adds reaching 61,000. The aforementioned EBITDA figure represents the best result in this segment that Sprint managed to achieve in nearly a decade, with Claure touting the company’s improving prospects and the fact that it managed to transform its cost structure in recent months. The wireless carrier is presently in the process of cutting between $1.3 billion and $1.5 billion in costs in its current fiscal year, as revealed by its latest financials which also saw an EBITDA guidance increase on the low end of the range, with Sprint stating that it now expects an EBITDA of between $10.8 billion and $11.2 billion, whereas its previous guidance started at $10.7 billion. Sprint’s annual operating guidance forecasts an income in the range from $2.1 billion to $2.5 billion, marking a $100 million increase on the low end of the prediction range compared to the figure provided by its Q1 2017 report.
Investors remain somewhat reserved about Sprint’s prospects; while its shares increased by several percentage points to $8.20 when the market opened on Tuesday, the situation quickly stabilized and Sprint is now once again trading at just under $8 per share. Some industry analysts previously argued that the company is running a business that’s too leveraged, which is why the SoftBank-owned wireless carrier may be pursuing a merger that it’s been discussing with a number of actors in recent months. With cable giant Charter publicly refusing the idea of a consolidation with Sprint earlier today, the company is expected to return to its merger talks with T-Mobile in the near future.