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Network provider Chorus has reported a net loss of $9 million for the year to the end of June 2024, compared with a profit of $25 million in 2023.
This was due to a one-off $15 million non-cash tax expense following the removal of deductibility of depreciation for buildings and an $11 million increase in depreciation from the accelerated write-down of copper assets as well as higher interest costs.
Inflation-linked price changes together with growth in the uptake of high-speed fibre plans lifted revenue by 3% from $980 million to $1 billion.
Operating expenditure of $310 million was $2 million higher than 2023, however, Chorus said tight cost management and favourable weather mostly offset the impact of inflationary cost increases.
EBITDA was $700 million, up 4% on 2023.
Fibre connections grew by 53,000 to make up 87% of Chorus’ fixed lines, with fibre uptake at 71.4% of addresses. Chorus is chasing 80% uptake by 2030.
Data demand grew almost 8% to 7,974 petabytes with the fibre network carried 94% of this traffic while average monthly use for fibre connections grew 6.5% to 623GB, surpassing COVID lockdown levels.
Chorus CEO Mark Aue told shareholders today that Chorus was making solid progress in its shift to becoming a simpler, all-fibre digital infrastructure company.
“We accelerated our programme to retire the copper network and there are fewer than 45,000 copper connections remaining where our fibre is available,” he said.
Chorus was therefore “well on track” to retiring copper in urban fibre areas by the end of 2026.
“We’ve closed more than 1,250 copper broadband cabinets so far and will soon have our first fibre-only suburban exchanges,” Aue said.
“We’re already seeing the benefits of this shift with electricity usage down by another 3% in FY24 as legacy network equipment is powered down.”
The reduction in electricity usage, together with 87 per cent of renewable generation in the electricity grid, meant Chorus’ Scope 1 and 2 emissions were down 39 per cent against its 2020 base year.
Chorus’ copper footprint would reduce further with the rollout of fibre to another 10,000 premises due to be completed in its 2025 financial year.
That rollout would cover 59 communities and about 25% of addresses had already registered their interest in connecting.
Last week, regulator the Commerce Commission disallowed $172.6 million of proposed Chorus investment that it said would have forced prices up.
The European Fibre to the Home Council ranks New Zealand 17th in the world for fibre uptake.
“With a success story as the great network builder now evolving to be the great network operator, we’re focussed on driving fibre uptake, growing new revenues by leveraging our core network assets more effectively, and retiring
Chorus will pay an unimputed final dividend of 28.5 cents per share in October 2024 bringing total dividends for the year to 47.5 cents per share.