Cellcom Israel Q4 Profit Falls

Cellcom Israel Ltd CEL reported a drop in its net profit for the fourth quarter. Cellcom Israel's quarterly net profit slipped 46% to 55 million shekels ($13.6 million). Its revenue declined 5.7% to 1.14 billion shekels ($293 million). However, analysts were expecting a profit of 54 million shekels on revenue of 1.11 billion shekels. Service revenue slipped 14.5% to NIS 835 million. EBITDA dropped 15.8% to NIS 282 million in the quarter, while operating income fell 22.9% to NIS 131 million. At the end of 2014, Cellcom Israel had 2.967 million cellular subscribers. Nir Sztern, the Company's Chief Executive Officer, said, "Even in this year of intense competition in the cellular market, Cellcom group continues to present good financial results, demonstrated by a free cash flow of approximately NIS 1.2 billion, net income of NIS 354 million and an increase in revenue from sales of end user equipment. We continue to take cost-efficiency measures in order to adjust our cost structure in response to heightened competition level in the market. The efficiency measures we implemented following the merger with Netvision have led to savings at an annual run rate of approximately NIS 850 million." Cellcom Israel shares fell 1.79% to close at $4.95 on Friday.