DITO CME Holdings Corp. said Monday net loss widened by 173.8 percent in the first nine months on higher operating expenses of telecommunications subsidiary DITO Telecommunity Corp.
The company said it posted a consolidated net loss of P26.42 billion from January to September, higher than the P9.65-billion loss in the same period last year.
DITO CME blamed the huge losses to the higher operating expenses and other charges offset by gross revenue generated from the start of Dito Tel’s commercial operations on March 8, 2021.
Consolidated revenues reached P5.04 billion, mainly due to revenues generated by DITO Tel.
DITO Tel had 13.1 million subscribers with a monthly average revenue per user of P77.3 as of end-September.
The group reported a capital deficiency of P28.70 billion as of end-September from a capital deficiency of P2.5 billion in December last year.
This was linked to the net loss recognized by the group in 2021 and 2022 driven by the commercial rollout of DITO Tel.
“Despite the reported capital deficiency, management is confident that the group can continue as a going concern as management believes that the group’s ability to continue as a going concern is dependent upon its ability to generate sufficient cash flows to meet its maturing obligations,” the company said.
“To achieve this, the group continues to ramp up its commercial operations through targeted subscriber acquisition and promotional activities aimed at increasing revenue. The group will continue to efficiently implement its network roll-out plan and cost-saving measures to improve the results of operations,” it said.
DITO said to fund the group’ s expenditures related to the construction of the network, it secured an executed term sheet for a project finance loan facility of about $3.9 billion (P198.7 billion) which is expected to be closed in the fourth quarter of 2022.
“Moreover, the group has plans to do various fund-raising activities, which include a follow-on offering and private equity placements at the parent company level, wherein proceeds will be used to fund the group’s telecommunications and digital businesses funding requirements,” the company said.
“Lastly, the minority shareholders of DITO Tel are also committed to infuse additional capital in accordance with the schedule of infusion indicated in the investment agreement,” it said.