KUALA LUMPUR: Shares of Maxis Bhd climbed during the early trading session on Bursa Malaysia today, buoyed by the telecommunications company’s robust net profit for the first quarter ended March 31, 2024 (1Q 2024).
As of 10.10 am, the stock rose by three sen to RM3.75, with 559,500 shares changing hands.
Maxis’ net profit rose to RM353 million for 1Q 2024 from RM320 million in 1Q 2023, driven by higher service revenue.
The company also declared a first interim dividend of four sen per share, to be paid on June 24, 2024.
Kenanga Research maintained an ‘Outperform’ rating for Maxis with a target price of RM5.30.
“We continue to like Maxis due to its sustained subscriber net additions in the postpaid segment, supported by its convergence strategy; its collaboration with Huawei to drive 5.5G commercialisation and expectations of a ramp-up in enterprise segment earnings,” it said in a note today.
Meanwhile, MIDF Research noted that Maxis is focusing on improving its operating free cash flow and maintaining defensive capex spending.
“Based on this, we do not foresee the group revising the quarterly dividend payment to five sen per share anytime soon,” it said.
The research house also stated that it keeps its earnings estimates unchanged at this juncture while rolling forward the valuation base year to 2025.
“We also reduced our terminal growth rate assumption to one per cent,” it said, adding that MIDF Research maintains a ‘Neutral’ call with a revised target price of RM3.87 following the announcement of the 1Q results. – BERNAMA
