Bezeq The Israel Telecommunication Corp. Ltd (BEZQ) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

[Audio Gap] Following the presentation of our results, we will have a Q&A session. With that said, let me now turn the call over to Tomer for his opening remarks. After his introduction, I will continue the presentation of our group's financial highlights, followed by Nir, who will discuss Bezeq's Fixed-Line results; and Ilan, who will cover the results from Pelephone. I will conclude the presentation with Bezeq International results.

Thank you, Yochai, and good morning, good afternoon, everyone, and welcome. Let's start on Slide 3. We had another busy quarter with excellent results and significant progress in our group strategy with accelerated momentum across all our growth engines, including fiber, 5G and IPTV at yes. A key indicator to our successful quarter is the mid-single-digit growth in ARPU across all services, which led to 3% growth in core revenue and to double-digit growth in adjusted EBITDA and the adjusted net profit, which were also positively impacted by the write-up at yes due to the Partner TV deal. The group continued to report growth in total broadband retail subscribers, driven by accelerated fiber deployment, enhanced customer value and our ability to offer bundled services at yes. The infrastructure revolution led by the group positions the Israeli economy at a very high level of resilience and readiness for the AI era, where we as the group serve as an enabler, as an adopter and also provider of AI services. As part of the group's core strategy, we will continue to invest and identify future growth engines. Most recently, we announced we are reviewing a couple of potential synergistic acquisitions, the acquisition of Exelera Telecom and Hot Mobile. In parallel, regulation in Israel continues to evolve and is gradually becoming more and more consistent with global trends. In addition to recent formal progress in the process to remove structural separation and following the completion of the copper switch-off reform earlier this year, the MOC also published a wholesale tariff hearing, which marks an important and historical milestone given the suggestion to gradually remove most of the wholesale tariff supervision in Israel following a 2-year transition period. It reflects the regulators' recognition that the market is competitive and mature enough for such a move with the understanding that Israeli consumers will continue to benefit from advanced services at competitive prices. Last week, we once again revised our 2025 outlook upwards, now expecting adjusted EBITDA of ILS 3.85 billion and adjusted net profit of ILS 1.45 billion. Moving to the next slide. Our tech and business road map is on track to reach our midterm KPI targets, including the completion of fiber deployments this year and also reaching at least 40% take-up in the midterm, continuing our consistent ARPU growth across all verticals and leveraging our leading position in 5G and TV. On Slide 5, you can see a good snapshot of our financial highlights for this quarter, both in top line as well as strong profitability and free cash flow metrics. We are very proud of our achievements and of our consistent ability to deliver on bottom line results. Turning to Slide 6. Let me point out that you can really see how even in a year with volatile geopolitical situation, our core business continued to perform and outperform. Total fiber subs as of today reached 924,000 with over 2.8 million home passed. 5G subs reached 1.3 million and ARPU grew approximately 5%. Yes ARPU from subscribers, which includes TV and fiber was up 3% and reached ILS 189. I will now turn the call over to Yochai who will elaborate further on the group results.

Thank you, Tomer. Moving to Slide 7, where we show a 3.1% increase in core revenues due to higher core revenues from all key group segments. Adjusted EBITDA grew 11.3% and adjusted net profit grew 46% due to the increase in the valuation of yes. Turning to the next slide, we show the half year trends, which were similar to Q2 in revenues and profitability. Free cash flow was impacted by Bezeq's Fixed-Line tax assessment paid in the first half of 2025 and a tax refund received in the corresponding period. Moving to the next slide, we show our operating expenses. Salary expenses decreased 5.5% due to the sale of Bezeq Online and its deconsolidation as of Q2 2025. We recorded decreases in operating expenses and depreciation expenses mainly due to the change in the valuation of yes. The next slide shows our quarterly operational metrics. Broadband retail ARPU continued to grow. In addition, we recorded increases in Pelephone ARPU as well as in yes ARPU year-over-year due to fiber growth. Slide 11 highlights our balanced capital structure with net debt at ILS 4.9 billion and a coverage ratio of 1.5x. We remain committed to maintaining our high credit rating. Moving to the next slide. In accordance with our 80% dividend payout policy, the Board of Directors recommended a distribution of ILS 583 million or ILS 0.21 per share, reflecting 50% growth in the dividend per share. Moving to the next slide. We recently upgraded group's guidance for 2025 for the second time this year. We are now forecasting adjusted EBITDA of ILS 3.85 billion and adjusted net profit of ILS 1.45 billion. I will now turn the call over to Nir, who will share more detailed results from our Fixed-Line operations.

Thank you, Yochai. I'm very proud for this quarter performance, thanks to our nationwide advanced network and the successful implementation of our strategy. Turning to Slide 14. Fixed-Line core revenue increased 4.5% to ILS 979 million, driven by an increase across all core revenue items. Broadband retail fiber customers reached 592,000 today and ARPU rose 5.4% year-over-year to ILS 136. On the following slide, we show Q2 financial highlights with adjusted net profit down 8.1% to ILS 216 million, mainly due to higher financial expenses resulting from the impact of the dollar shekel exchange rate on hedging transaction. Free cash flow was up 20%, mainly due to timing differences in working capital. Turning to the next slide, we show continued fiber deployment reaching over 2.8 million homes passed with over 924,000 active subscribers in our fiber networks today, representing 63% of total broadband subscribers and resulting in a take-up rate of 33%. Moving to the next slide, we show the take-up trend. Q2 showed 29,000 retail fiber net adds and 15,000 wholesale fiber net adds. Turning to the next slide. Broadband revenues were up 2.8% despite the decrease in the wholesale tariffs from using our passive network. Transmission and data revenues grew 5.5% to ILS 309 million and other revenues grew 14% due to higher revenues from infrastructure projects. With that, I will now turn the call to Ilan to discuss Pelephone and yes.

Thank you, Nir. Moving to Slide 19. Pelephone posted 3.7% growth in service revenues, reaching ILS 361 million, driven by continued growth in ARPU and postpaid subscribers, including 5G subscriber plans despite the impact on roaming revenues in June due to the war with Iran. 5G postpaid subscriber plans grew by 39,000, reaching 1.33 million subscribers today. 5G MAX subscribers reached 80,000 today, and we raised our estimated and are now expecting to reach 150,000 5G MAX subscribers by the end of the year. This is another great example of Pelephone's leadership position and technological advancement, which provides real added value to our customers. Moving to the next slide. Adjusted EBITDA and adjusted net profit were impacted by the war with Iran as well as the increase in frequency fees resulting from the termination of the MOC discount period. Free cash flow was up 59%, reaching ILS 43 million, mainly due to timing differences in working capital. Moving to the next slide, we show 5G postpaid subscriber plans reaching over 1.3 million subscribers as of today, representing 58% of postpaid subscribers and Q2 service revenues showing consistent growth over the last few years. The next slide shows Q2 key operational metrics. As seen, we recorded an additional increase in postpaid subscribers. ARPU rose 4.5% or ILS 2 year-over-year. Turning to yes on Slide 23. First, it's truly outperforming in the past few quarters with innovation, premium content, increased focus on free cash flow as most of the migration from satellite is near to completion. You can see all of this in the results and more to come. Revenues increased 1.3% to ILS 320 million due to higher revenues from the TV fiber bundle. Pro forma adjusted EBITDA rose 30% to ILS 56 million, driven by higher revenues and streamlining of expenses. Total TV subscribers increasing by 1,000 this quarter, representing the first quarterly increase in total subscribers since Q1 2023. We posted quarterly growth with 9,000 net fiber subscriber adds, reaching 100,000 as of today. Moving to the next slide. Pro forma adjusted net profit was down 69% due to higher financial expenses resulting from a decrease in the value of hedging transaction due to a decline in U.S. dollar exchange rate. On the next slide, I would like to highlight the ILS 5 year-over-year growth in ARPU from subscribers due to higher revenues from fiber plans. We showed continued growth in IP subscribers reaching 483,000 today, representing 86% of total subscribers. With that, let me now turn the call back to Yochai.

Thank you, Ilan. Moving to Bezeq International on Slide 26. Business revenues grew 6.4%, mainly due to higher revenues from cloud activities, the sale of business equipment and international telephony services. Adjusted EBITDA was down mainly due to lower revenue from consumers. We are continuing with our streamlining plan, including the implementation of the employee retirement agreement for the years 2025 through 2027.

With that, I will open the Q&A session. [Operator Instructions] I will now pass to poll for questions.

Chris Reimer from Barclays. Congratulations on the strong results also. I was wondering if we could talk about the Exelera proposed acquisition. And if you can talk about how you see the potential in that asset? And are you acquiring also a customer base? Or is it just the asset?

Yes. So I'll address that briefly. First, we submitted a nonbinding LOI for a potential acquisition as reported. We started the initial diligence. So this is very preliminary stage. So I'm not going to comment on that transaction, but I will mention a comment on the strategy and the trends. As previously mentioned, and I think we talked about this, and this is a good great question. Today, most of the international cable from Europe to Asia go through the Suez Canal. Bezeq Fixed-Line recently completed a project as a subcontractor for Google to lay down a new cable from Europe to Asia through Israel and Saudi Arabia. Given the regional developments and given the need for redundancy for all the global hyperscalers, we see a very big opportunity across data needs and capacity for additional terrestrial cables and Israel sits geographically at the best intersection for these type of cables. And we're probably going to see more and more, and we expect to be a player in that potential upside, but this is pretty early days. But that's the context of how we see this market evolve given the need for redundancy in the regions.

Okay. Regarding salaries, you mentioned the decrease had to do with the disposal of the Bezeq Online unit. But going forward, considering you almost -- well, you've basically reached your rollout on the fiber, correct me if I'm wrong there, but how should we look at wages going forward considering the decrease in spend on the infrastructure as well as the ongoing employee agreements?

So we have collective union agreements across the board, across the different subsidiaries. We -- this year -- and we talked about this, we have the right under the current agreement with the Fixed-Line union to let up to 300 people retire. We will use a significant amount of these people as we reach the end of the fiber project, which have both impact on head count and non head count CapEx given we finish the deployment. So it will have some significant impact on head count cost, the Fixed-Line business entering next year because this year, Q4, you'll see a provision cash flow impact, positive one next year, negative and positive and -- on one hand. On the other hand, at the international business, as Yochai mentioned, we have a new agreement to be able to retire up to 250 people in the next 2 to 3 years. That's also something that would impact wages in the coming year or so.

Next question from David Kaplan from Psagot.

I have a couple of quick questions. The first one is, when I look at the results from this quarter and if we strip out the impact of the revaluations of yes, there wasn't actually a great deal of growth in EBITDA. So how should we think about the growth of Bezeq going forward, keeping in mind that Bezeq while overall is seeing subscriber growth as a group, we're seeing some cannibalization of that -- of those subscribers by [ STING ] on the television side and by yes on the broadband side from its higher revenue cousins, so to speak? That's my first question.

I think it's very straightforward. Our EBITDA this quarter without the one-off was as expected, flattish. But as you look at the different categories of the businesses between Bezeq Fixed-Line, yes, predominantly, you've seen growth in EBITDA, putting aside accounting impact. You see some softness at Pelephone given roaming and spectrum fees comparing to previous quarter last year. So that's very easy to explain. But we -- this is very in line with our expectations, and we continue to expect at least 2% CAGR in our going-forward EBITDA exactly as we communicated. And you see the different KPIs are actually above expectations. So we're very happy with these results, even putting aside these one-offs. Yes alone, excluding all the accounting, grew 30% in EBITDA this quarter, okay, without all the accounting impact. So that speaks to some of the trends in the business.

Okay. Bezeq International, we saw a drop in the revenues versus the previous quarter. What was that related to?

Bezeq International actually grew its core revenues significantly this quarter compared to previous.

Core revenue in Bezeq International increased by ILS 14 million versus previous -- versus the parallel quarter.

Correct. 6% growth.

Yes. But not versus the previous quarter. You lost ILS [ 1 ] million...

Correct. You will continue to see legacy going down and you have some of the impact on the projects and integration business timing. But overall, you will continue to see significant growth and kind of mid- to high single digits in the core revenue aspect of that, but profitability will still go down in the transition period given you're losing the legacy ISP business, which is noncore. And as you can see, core revenues growing and this is -- timing definitely impacts. The time of year impacts this business given the large projects, but profitability will go down given the transition we talked about or transformation we talked about.

Okay. Just a quick follow-up on the question that Chris asked about the cable business. You mentioned the data center growth or potential data center growth in Israel. Do you see Bezeq being a player on the infrastructure side of that or more as a service provider in transmission?

We will continue to be a leading infrastructure player on connectivity, both terrestrial and hopefully also international. At this point, we are a big player in the colocation data center business. But in the hyperscaler business, we're currently not a player.

Okay. Great. And my last question, the financing expenses were higher this quarter. I think it has something to do with hedging of the dollar. Can you explain how that impacts or going to impact CapEx or finance going forward?

So as part of the group's hedging policy, part of the companies in the groups are hedging against the change in the Israeli shekel versus the dollar. This quarter, we saw the Israeli shekel strengthening versus the U.S. dollar. So we had to reevaluate this transaction, and it resulted in approximately ILS 50 million loss, which was all recorded in this quarter. So going ahead, I would assume that this kind of impact will not be seen in the coming quarters.

And the strategy behind that, though, does it have an impact on CapEx in any way, shape or form?

Yes. So it's to hedge both CapEx and both operational expenses. Part of the expenses on a group level are exposed to the U.S. dollar, and we want to mitigate this risk. Next question from Ondrej from UBS.

Two questions for me, please. One is on the other transaction that we haven't spoken about yet. So your bid for the mobile assets of Hot. I was wondering what the kind of process is there? And is it somewhat related at least in terms of who gets to decide on the final outcome of this to the removal of the structural separation? And I guess where I'm coming from is, in the past, we haven't been used to too many positive regulatory events around Bezeq. So these 2 events could be potentially both very positive. So will it even be -- I think -- I guess where I'm coming from, will it even be allowed to happen at the same time because the time line kind of potentially coincides. So that's one question. And then the second question would be around the remainder of the assets, primarily the fixed asset. I was just wondering, should that, for example, be acquired in the case of a full exit of Altice from Israel, should that be acquired by a private equity? Is there a risk you think to the overall competitive dynamics on the fixed side, assuming mobile can improve, but is there some kind of risk to the fixed side of it, there's maybe a new entrant coming in? Or you think that is not a concern at all?

The problem is that you know the market too well. First, thank you for the questions. One important comment before specifically addressing, you mentioned about regulatory news. I would counter that Israel has been with relatively volatile regulatory environment in the previous decade. In the past 4 to 5 years, we've seen, if not all good news, but more constructive and rational regulatory decisions even with 4 different governments and 5 different ministers, very constructive and adopting more and more reforms that are consistent with European approach. They removed structural separation between infrastructure and ISP. We saw the copper switch-off reform. We saw the wholesale hearing, which had pros and cons, but it's more consistent with regulatory approach in Europe. So overall, you see constructive rationale and not bad -- good news, but constructive one. So just a general comment for the -- reflecting on the past 5 years, maybe not 15 years, but 5 years. Specific to your question, Altice is running a process, right, to sell their Israeli asset. As part of that, we submitted an indication of interest to join the process. They are in a process. There are no time lines yet for first round bid, if you will. But we basically submitted an interest and also evaluation ILS 2 billion for the mobile unit only on behalf of Pelephone. It has nothing to do with structural separation. And we will update the market if there is anything to update at this point. They are in a process. We have to join the process, and we are standing still. The rationale for that and the synergies, I think, are obvious, but we think this will benefit significantly the mobile market in Israel, the infrastructure level investment and the ranking of Israel in the mobile and cellular industry in terms of mobile speeds and network efficiency nationwide. Structural separation, to your question, we did update the market on the progress on what the MOC is formally communicating. In April, they announced they will conclude their review and make a decision this way or another by end of this year. Recently, they also announced they hired an economic adviser and also basically announced some sort of RFI to the market as part of the formal process. So we see it progressing in a very formal way, and we hope to hear news in Q4 around that topic. The structural separation, the focus is Bezeq Fixed-Line and yes, less relevant to the other subsidiaries in the business at this point.

If I may, just do you have any views on the potential future of the fixed market if the fixed asset is exited as well? And then...

I don't think -- I forgot to answer this point. Sorry. So I don't think the change in ownership changes the market dynamics. I do think if you look in the past few years, the change in ownership benefited competition and level of investments and got this market a lot better in any shape or form. We are proud to be one of the leaders, but we're not alone. And this market evolved, thanks to this change in ownership in Bezeq and Partner and Cellcom, coming up IBC and probably Hot follows. I think it's only good to the market to have rational shareholders with long-term view.

And one quick follow-up, if I may, on the mobile side because I think part of your CapEx plans, I think you've mentioned for the next several years is just the rollout of 5G where Israel maybe just like Europe maybe a bit behind some of the other economies that you would benchmark to like the North America, Asia, Middle Eastern economies in the Gulf. And then -- so my question is basically, is the maybe underinvestment angle part of the rationale of even thinking of doing consolidation in Israel currently?

Look, I think the ARPUs in Israeli mobile are relatively low compared to the world and low to begin with. And I see there's a lot of upside there, and we talked about that in the context of 5G and telephone strategy. I think on a group level, we communicated a reduction in CapEx going forward that comes from end of fiber rollout. It does not come from lower CapEx for the cellular business, it will remain elevated given we expect to deploy more and invest more as part of our long-term plan. We never guided for reduced CapEx on the cellular business. But on a group level, we do expect to go from the 20% CapEx to, say, level down to the 16% to 18% we have been talking about for the past year.

Next question we have is from Siyi from Citi.

I have 2, please, and both of them are relating to your views on your midterm guidance, hopefully, different aspects. The first one is I'm wondering if you can talk about the upselling opportunities that you saw in Israel on both 5G and fiber. Because if I look at the growth rate of your ARPU in both fixed and mobile, it seems that you could be more than comfortable to reach the top end of your guidance. So I'm wondering if we look at the upselling opportunity, do you feel that your original -- it is according to original plan or it's actually better than you expected? And my second question is on the midterm EBITDA CAGR. You talked about that you expect to grow at 2%. But considering that the top line pressure is going to phase out on international and then you have the cost savings coming through. And just wondering what you think about this 2% CAGR. Do you think that is conservative as well?

I'll start high level and you guys to add. First, on the EBITDA point, yes, we expect at least 2% CAGR. Obviously, we still have the legacy high-margin revenue declining, which is still 5-plus percent of total GAAP revenues, which will still impact EBITDA. But -- you're right that with the phasing out of fiber deployment and some of the head count reduction, we will see a better OpEx profile. We expect to hopefully get 2% or more than 2% in the coming years, but we have to take into account this legacy revenue reduction that will be with us in the next 2 to 3 years. Secondly, to your question on ARPUs in general, I think you see across the board that our playbook does not come from raising prices, generally speaking, it comes from adding value to customers. And most of the ARPU growth on the fiber business came from migration from copper to fiber, which will continue over the next 2 years. And then the next evolution of that is multi-gig, 2.5% gig, 5 gig, which will contribute in addition to other value-add services. And I think it's the same on the mobile business. People are willing to pay more for 5G. But guys, if you have anything else to add on that?

No, I can add that the ILS 45 to ILS 50 on ARPU based on the transformation from 4G to 5G and now from 5G to 5G MAX. So we are now on ILS 46, and we have guidance from ILS 45 to ILS 50. So we are on track. We see now that -- we'll see how the transition will go from 5G to 5G MAX, and then we'll see if this index ILS 45 to ILS 50 is right. But now as we see, this is the right plan for us, ILS 45 to ILS 50.

So if there are no further questions at this time, I would like to thank you all for taking the time to join us today. Should you have any follow-up questions, please feel free to contact our Investor Relations department. We look forward to speaking to you on the third quarter 2025 earnings call. Thank you.