Helios Towers revenue and underlying earnings grow YTD

Telecommunications firm Helios Towers said on Thursday that both revenues and underlying earnings had increased year-to-date.

Helios stated revenues increased 5% in the third quarter, hitting $114.4m, while year-to-date revenues grew 6% to $326.8m, driven by the firm's acquisition of Free Senegal's tower portfolio and continued organic tenancy growth.

Adjusted underlying earnings increased 4% quarter-on-quarter to $60.8m and 5% year-on-year to $175.0m.

The FTSE 250-listed firm added that year-to-date portfolio free cash flow and cash generated from operations had decreased 11% to $118.7m and 32% to $98.6m, respectively.

Helios highlighted that the business was underpinned by long-term contracted revenues of $3.7bn, up from $2.7bn at the same time a year earlier, of which 99% was from multinational MNOs, with an average remaining life of 7.6 years.

Outgoing chief executive Kash Pandya said: "We are delighted to deliver our strongest quarter of organic tenancy additions in six years, with 683 incremental organic tenancies and we have a busy quarter ahead, reflecting the significant demand we are seeing from mobile operators across all our markets.

"Our tenancy pipeline remains robust and accordingly, we have reiterated our full-year tenancy outlook and look forward to supporting our customers' network expansion in Q4 2021 and beyond."

As of 0945 BST, Helios shares were down 2.88% at 161.60p.