According to preliminary data, STC’s 9m 2003 revenues reached Rub 9.5 bln, increasing 25.1% year-on-year. Provision of telecommunications services generated an revenues of Rub 9.3 bln (+27% y-o-y). Operating costs stood at Rub 7.1 bln (+25.7%).

EBITDA reached Rub 3.2 bln (+27.7% y-o-y), operating profit – Rub 2.4 bln (+22.8%). TheEBITDA-revenueratiowentupto33.6%.

According to preliminary data, pre-tax profit slid 21.9% down to Rub 1.6 bln. The year-on-year increase in comparable conditions (excluding profit from sales of financial assets in 2002) amounted to 37.7%.

In addition, 9m capital investments amounted to Rub 4.6 mln (+127.8% y-o-y), and new fixed assets to Rub 3.3 bln (+149.4%). New automatic telephone exchanges have been commissioned, with a total installed capacity of 281,200 lines. The company’s depreciation charges went up 42.7% to Rub 0.8 bln on the back of active use of lease financing mechanisms for capital investments, as well as a substantial increase in the number of newly commissioned capital assets.  

Since the beginning of 2003, the number of base telephone lines grew by 191,600 (+319% against 9m 2002); 140,500 of them are urban, and 51,500 are rural lines. Thus, as of 01.10.2003, STC is servicing 3.46 mln base telephone lines, including 2.63 mln urban lines and 830,000 rural lines.

Volume of long-distance traffic for 9m 2003 amounted to 1.435 mln minutes (+17.8%), including 1.357 mln minutes of long-distance traffic (18.5% more y-o-y) and 78 mln minutes of international long-distance (7.9% more y-o-y).

The average number of staff on payroll is contracting systematically. As of 01.10.2003, headcount amounts to 41,064 (3.5% less than the number at the beginning of the year).