VOD.L - Vodafone Group Plc
| Previous close | 161.00 |
| Open | 161.30 |
| Bid | 161.54 x 0 |
| Ask | 161.52 x 0 |
| Day's range | 160.86 - 162.76 |
| 52-week range | 1.50 - 1,602.00 |
| Volume | 36,740,206 |
| Avg. volume | 84,394,022 |
| Market cap | 43.317B |
| Beta (3Y monthly) | 1.27 |
| PE ratio (TTM) | N/A |
| EPS (TTM) | -28.20 |
| Earnings date | 12 Nov 2019 |
| Forward dividend & yield | 0.08 (4.99%) |
| Ex-dividend date | 2019-06-06 |
| 1y target est | 2.01 |
- Reuters - UK Focus
New German telecom rules don't exclude Huawei
Germany's federal network regulator on Tuesday unveiled rules for the build-out of 5G mobile networks that, in a snub to the United States, do not exclude China's Huawei Technologies. "The requirements are not specifically directed at individual vendors," said a spokesman for the federal regulator BNetzA, adding that further regulation will be introduced if required. The United States has piled pressure on its allies to shut out Huawei, the leading telecoms equipment vendor with a global market share of 28%, saying its gear contained 'back doors' that would enable China to spy on other countries.
- Bloomberg
The Upside to Facebook’s Libra Disaster
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- It’s just as well that big companies that process and facilitate payments have quit Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency project, fearing a regulatory backlash. If Facebook really wants to bring financial services to the “unbanked,” it should try doing it on a smaller scale than these companies’ presence promised. And even then, the probability of failure will be high.It’s clear why PayPal Holdings Inc., Stripe Inc., eBay Inc., MasterCard Inc. and Visa Inc. have decided not to join the Libra Association, which Facebook has been organizing to run the proposed digital currency. They took seriously the recent warning of Senators Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Sherrod Brown of Ohio that because of their membership, they could “expect a high level of scrutiny from regulators not only on Libra-related payment activities, but on all payment activities.” The concern is that a cryptocurrency used in conjunction with encrypted messaging could potentially be used in illegal transactions, and anyone involved in creating such an opportunity would be suspect.U.S. regulators are perfectly capable of scuppering major cryptocurrency projects. On Oct. 11, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced it had stopped Telegram Group Inc. from distributing digital tokens, so-called Grams, to the investors who contributed $1.7 billion to the creation of the cryptocurrency last year. These include major U.S. venture capital firms such as Benchmark, Sequoia and Lightspeed. The same could easily happen to Libra.That’s the problem with starting so big. Telegram’s token offering was the biggest ever recorded. Facebook made a big announcement on Libra and presented a list of partners that read like a Who’s Who of the payments industry. They envisaged global launches for their cryptocurrencies. Of course regulators and politicians were alarmed.To avoid this kind of outcome, Facebook — whose stated goal with Libra is to offer affordable payment services and loans to people currently priced out of the financial services market — could have tried the strategy that got results for one of its remaining partners, Vodafone Group Plc. Vodafone launched M-Pesa, Kenya’s storied “mobile money,” in 2007, and one of the project’s major assets was the Kenyan central bank’s consent to the launch without any formal regulation. Vodafone’s local cellular operator, Safaricom Plc, quickly built up a network of stores where people without bank accounts could pay in and receive cash, and old-fashioned mobile phones began to double as wallets for transfers and purchases. The lack of regulatory intervention and the large physical network, fed by relatively generous commissions, made sure that by 2019, M-Pesa claimed 37 million active customers in seven African countries. But attempts to transplant the service to many other markets have failed. Vodafone has closed M-Pesa in India (in part because of regulatory obstacles), South Africa (low customer interest), Romania and Albania (apparently it was unprofitable). Vodafone discovered there was no cookie-cutter solution. In different countries, lenders, retailers and mobile operators offered competing services, and regulatory scrutiny varied. To find countries in which to launch such an electronic money service, one would need to go down the list of nations with large populations of the unbanked. The top 20, according to the World Bank, includes big ones, such as China, India, Indonesia and Brazil.But in most of these countries, people are already using some form of digital money in lieu of dealing with traditional financial institutions. That’s why the list of 20 countries with the smallest percentage of people who have recently made or received digital payments looks completely different.In other words, it’s not easy to find a country where a lot of people have neither a bank account nor access to other kinds of financial services. And then there’s a chance that the cash-using population of a specific country wants to stay that way. One possible reason M-Pesa didn’t quite work in Albania and Romania is that these countries have large informal economies. With up to a third of gross domestic product “in the shadow,” traceable electronic transactions are unattractive compared with cash. These difficulties of finding good target markets, and ones with friendly regulators to boot, should explain Facebook’s desire to launch at scale, to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. But the risk with this approach is that the idea of offering cheap financial services to the unbanked begins to look like a smokescreen for building a huge unregulated bank in the developed world — just what regulators in Europe and the U.S. fear the most.Instead of pushing ahead with the remaining partners and risking the same kind of trouble as Telegram, Facebook should go back to the drawing board and start thinking of smaller projects tailor-made to specific countries’ requirements. Expansion would be slow, and there would be failures and miscalculations along the way, but regulators in each market might be easier to persuade that the project’s goals aren’t nefarious. To contact the author of this story: Leonid Bershidsky at lbershidsky@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Tobin Harshaw at tharshaw@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Leonid Bershidsky is Bloomberg Opinion's Europe columnist. He was the founding editor of the Russian business daily Vedomosti and founded the opinion website Slon.ru.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Yahoo Finance UK
Vodafone blames ‘technical error’ after customers get £10,000 roaming charges
Vodafone said that it was 'very sorry' that customers were hit with thousands of pounds in roaming charges and had their phone services cut off on Sunday.
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 3-Facebook's Libra announces board as support shrinks further
LONDON/SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Backers of Facebook Inc's Libra cryptocurrency project pledged to forge ahead after selecting a five-member board on Monday, shrugging off the latest member defection by online travel company Booking Holding earlier in the day. The owner of Priceline, Kayak and Booking.com on Monday confirmed that it had pulled out of the group, which is trying to bring digital coins into mainstream commerce. Libra lost its last global payments backers on Friday, when Mastercard Inc and Visa Inc abandoned the Geneva-based Libra Association.
- Bloomberg
Did Cable Cowboy John Malone Just Blink in a Deal?
(Bloomberg Opinion) -- Did John Malone just blink in an M&A deal? The cable tycoon’s Liberty Global Plc has just agreed to help finance Sunrise Communications Group AG’s 6.3 billion Swiss francs ($6.3 billion) purchase of Liberty’s business in Switzerland. It’s a neat way of lending a helping hand to a struggling buyer without being seen to soften the terms of the deal itself. It still may not be enough to get the transaction done.Sunrise’s purchase of Malone’s UPC Switzerland has been on the ropes for months. The Swiss buyer’s biggest shareholder, German telecoms operator Freenet AG, and a couple of investment funds are opposed. Sunrise needs to do a 2.8 billion Swiss franc rights offer to pay for the deal, which in turn depends on majority shareholder support. Freenet’s opposition is unhelpful enough given its 25% stake. Last week, the shareholder advisory service ISS also recommended that investors withhold their support.That has rattled Liberty. Malone’s group now says it will put as much as 500 million Swiss francs into the rights offer if Sunrise’s own investors (most likely Freenet) don't stump up. This could be seen as a vote of confidence in the enlarged Sunrise from the American billionaire, which might make shareholders feel more comfortable about voting in favor of the fundraising. But the move could be seen equally as the price Liberty is willing to pay to get a deal over the line without amending the headline terms, for example by cutting the price or taking stock instead of cash.This deal isn’t cheap but it makes sense for Sunrise. The buyer reckons UPC is worth 5.1 billion Swiss francs on a standalone basis, and it values the cost savings and revenue gains of a deal at some 3.1 billion francs. That total value is worth nearly 2 billion francs more than the price being paid.Sure, UPC is probably worth less than Sunrise reckons. The same goes for those savings. Say UPC is more plausibly worth about 4.6 billion euros, based on it maybe making 600 million francs of Ebitda this year and commanding a multiple just shy of where Sunrise trades. And say you cut those anticipated savings by 25% and they’re worth 2.3 billion francs. On this view, the total value to Sunrise shareholders would still exceed the price paid, plus they would keep all the upside if the financial benefits of a deal turned out better than hoped.Sunrise shareholders could kill the deal in the hope of striking a better transaction with Liberty at a later date — maybe involving less cash, more stock and a cheaper price. After all, it’s now clear that Malone is fine with taking Sunrise shares. But Liberty is flush with cash at present from selling assets to Vodafone Group Plc. It can afford to spend some of that in defense of its interests. There's a big leap from that to believing Malone should, let alone will, swallow worse terms another day.To contact the author of this story: Chris Hughes at chughes89@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: James Boxell at jboxell@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Chris Hughes is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals. He previously worked for Reuters Breakingviews, as well as the Financial Times and the Independent newspaper.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Reuters - UK Focus
UPDATE 1-New German rules leave 5G telecoms door open to Huawei
Government officials confirmed that Germany's so-called security catalogue foresaw an evaluation of technical and other criteria, but that no single vendor would be barred in order to create a level playing field for equipment vendors. The United States has piled pressure on its allies to shut out Huawei, the leading telecoms equipment vendor with a global market share of 28%, saying its gear contained 'back doors' that would enable China to spy on other countries. German operators are all customers of Huawei and have warned that banning the Chinese vendor would add years of delays and billions of dollars in costs to launching 5G networks.
- Reuters - UK Focus
Facebook's Libra faces support test after big payment backers quit
Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency faces a pivotal meeting of backers on Monday, days after the would-be digital coin project suffered a severe blow as major payment firms quit. Mastercard and Visa abandoned the Geneva-based Libra Association on Friday, as did eBay, fintech startup Stripe and payments company Mercado Pago. Politicians and regulators from the United States to Europe have said that Libra risks upsetting global financial stability, undermining users' privacy and facilitating money laundering.
- Reuters - UK Focus
German security rulebook to keep 5G door open to Huawei - source
A new German security rulebook will not exclude Chinese telecoms equipment maker Huawei Technologies from supplying gear for the country's 5G mobile networks, a senior government source said on Monday. The 'security catalogue', due to be published this week, will confirm Germany's decision to keep a level playing field for suppliers to next-generation telecoms networks, despite calls by the United States to ban Huawei. Operators had warned that banning Huawei could add years of delays and billions of dollars in costs to rolling out 5G networks in Germany that could power super-fast home broadband, connected factories or, one day, self-driving cars.
- Bloomberg
Ethiopian Premier Abiy Wins Nobel Peace Prize for Eritrea Accord
(Bloomberg) -- Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to end almost two decades of conflict with neighboring Eritrea.Abiy was honored for his “efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighboring Eritrea,” the Oslo-based Norwegian Nobel Committee said in a statement Friday. It’s the second successive year the prize has gone to an African -- in 2018, Congolese doctor Denis Mukwege was the joint winner of the award for his work against sexual violence.“It is a prize given to Africa, given to Ethiopia and I can imagine how the rest of Africa’s leaders will take it positively to work on peace-building processes in our continent,” Abiy said in an audio recording of the Nobel committee informing him of the award.Abiy, 43, became Africa’s youngest leader when he was appointed prime minister in March 2018. He immediately set about implementing a swathe of economic and political reforms aimed at opening up the economy to increased foreign investment and freeing up the political space for opposition parties.Three months later, he made an historic visit to the Eritrean capital, Asmara, and met President Isaias Afwerki, to close a bloody chapter in the nation’s history: a 1998-2000 border war between the two states claimed as many as 100,000 lives. The nations clashed sporadically over the ensuing years, arming rebel groups in each others’ countries.While the rapprochement persuaded the United Nations to lift decade-old sanctions on Eritrea, there’s been scant progress since then. Four border crossings opened at the time of Abiy’s visit have since been closed without explanation. Territorial demarcations outlines by a 2002 boundary commission -- an initial condition of peace between the two countries -- remain unimplemented.At home, Abiy’s unbanning of Ethiopian opposition and rebel groups, has stoked political fragmentation and long-suppressed rivalries among ethnic communities. That’s led regional groups to intensify calls for more self-determination.Abiy’s changes have also faced growing opposition from anti-government groups and within the ruling party, which has factionalized under his rule. In June, attacks that claimed the lives of five senior government officials highlighted the extent of the challenges facing Abiy.Abiy has also begun implementing measures to attract more foreign investment to Ethiopia, with plans to open up the state-controlled telecommunications and other industries to private investors. That’s piqued the interest of companies including Orange SA, MTN Group Ltd. and Vodafone Group Plc.Ethiopia will be the fastest-growing economy in Africa this year, according to the International Monetary Fund, and globally only Bhutan, Yemen and Brunei will grow faster. The nation’s Eurobonds due December 2024 have returned 13.2% this year, more than the 13% average for sub-Saharan African sovereigns. Only Angola, Cameroon and Congo have offered better returns out of 17 nations on the continent that have sold Eurobonds.Born on Aug. 15, 1976, in the small town of Beshasha in Ethiopia’s Oromia state, Abiy holds masters degrees in business administration and transformational leadership and a PhD in traditional conflict resolution. He’s served as a lieutenant-colonel in the Ethiopian National Defense Force, an acting director of the country’s cyber-security intelligence agency and science and technology minister.Past laureates include former U.S. President Barack Obama and civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. The peace prize, along with awards in literature, physics and medicine, was created by Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel and first awarded in 1901. The economics prize, set to be revealed on Monday, was instituted by the Swedish central bank.(Updates with comment by Abiy in third paragraph)\--With assistance from Sveinung Sleire, Mike Cohen, Rene Vollgraaff and Robert Brand.To contact the reporters on this story: Nizar Manek in Nairobi at nmanek2@bloomberg.net;Mikael Holter in Oslo at mholter2@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Jonas Bergman at jbergman@bloomberg.net, Paul Richardson, Gordon BellFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Fool.co.uk
Vodafone shares: are they worth buying for the dividend?
Vodafone (LON: VOD) is a popular dividend stock. But is its dividend payout safe?
- Reuters - UK Focus
BT launches 5G smartphone plans for consumers and businesses
Britain's BT will launch 5G services in more than 20 towns and cities on Friday, offering its consumer and business customers its fastest connections across both fixed line and mobile. BT's mobile brand EE, the market leader, switched on Britain's first commercial 5G services in May. Rival Vodafone followed with its own network in July. BT said business customers and consumers signed up to broadband and mobile package BT Plus would be the first to be offered 5G, which will require a handset from a range including the Samsung Galaxy Note 10+, OnePlus 7 Pro and Huawei Mate 20.
- Bloomberg
Jio’s U-Turn on Voice Calls Lifts Vodafone, Bharti Shares
(Bloomberg) -- Shares of Vodafone Idea Ltd. and Bharti Airtel Ltd. surged after the wireless carrier controlled by Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani said it will end free voice calls on its network.Vodafone Idea rallied as much as 18% before ending the day with a 6% gain at the highest price since August. Bharti climbed 5% to the highest level since April last year, while Reliance Industries Ltd.’s shares rose for a third day.Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd. will charge customers 6 paise per minute for calls made to rival networks till such time that the telecom regulator moves to a zero termination-charge regime, the company said after market on Wednesday. Jio users, however, will be compensated with free data of similar value.The move “seems like a big deal, insofar as the market has been waiting for Jio to move from a land grabber to focusing on profitable growth,” Chris Lane, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein said in a note.Reliance Jio stormed into the industry in 2016, and became the nation’s top telecom operator this year after free calls and cheap data lured millions of users and left rivals struggling under mounting debt. Vodafone Idea’s shares, for instance, are down more than 70% this year despite Thursday’s surge.READ: Bharti Airtel’s Losses May Ease as Jio Boosts User Fees: ReactJio has paid about 135 billion rupees ($1.9 billion) in user fees to rival operators since its launch, according to the statement. The regulator had planned to scrap these charges from January next year, but floated a fresh consultation paper to see if the date needed to be revised -- a move that forced Jio to go back on its promise to keep voice calls free.Here’s what brokerages said about Jio’s announcement:Sanford C. Bernstein“Jio’s effective 10% price increase should be a breadth of fresh air for the likes of Vodafone Idea, which has been left for dead, and Bharti Airtel”The first has an outperform recommendation on Bharti Airtel, while Vodafone is the preferred play on the sector due to “the extreme, asymmetric risk-reward.”Edelweiss Securities“Reliance Jio’s tariff hike is prima facie positive for the industry as it enables other operators to raise tariffs too.Other operators may see a drop in calls terminating on their networks, but the tariff hike should be able to compensate for it well. We are already building in 4% higher Q4FY20 ARPU (average revenue per user) for Bharti and Vodafone Idea than Q1FY20.”Dolat Capital Market“Jio’s majority subscriber base is on bundled plans and it is thus easier for it to charge for off-net calls which may not be the case with Bharti and Vodafone Idea.Nevertheless, we believe Bharti and Vodafone Idea may either replicate Jio’s move or innovate on product front to capitalize from Jio’s price increase.”Emkay Global Financial Services“Competition will follow suit with tariff hikes for their bundled plan subscribers, which should result in an ARPU increase of 7 rupee and 4 rupees for Bharti and Vodafone, respectively.Jio, on the other hand, will witness an ARPU increase of 17 rupees following the move.”(Closes shares in second paragraph)To contact the reporter on this story: P R Sanjai in Mumbai at psanjai@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Sam Nagarajan at samnagarajan@bloomberg.net, Ravil Shirodkar, Bhuma ShrivastavaFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
- Reuters - UK Focus
Russia's MTS says no firm agreements on Ukrainian unit sale
Russia's biggest mobile phone operator MTS said on Thursday it had no firm agreements on the possible sale of its Ukrainian unit, after a report said Azerbaijan's Bakcell was seeking approval from the Ukrainian authorities to buy it. "MTS is considering various possibilities for the development of its international business. Russian news agency Interfax reported on Thursday that Bakcell was seeking approval from Ukraine's anti-monopoly authority to buy MTS's unit, which operates under the Vodafone Ukraine brand.
- Stockopedia
Why the Vodafone share price (LON:VOD) could go higher
Stockopedia’s own data points to a jarringly simple stock market truth amidst the daily whirlwind of financial data: share prices that have gone up tend to kee8230;
- Fool.co.uk
Will closing 1,000 shops help the Vodafone share price?
Reducing its store portfolio by 15% - will this fundamental shift be good for Vodafone shares?
- Reuters - UK Focus
CORRECTED (OFFICIAL)-UPDATE 2-Vodafone to close more than 1,000 stores
Vodafone will shut 15% of its 7,700 stores and upgrade some of the remaining outlets as customers buy more online and change their expectations of in-store shopping, chief executive Nick Read said on Tuesday. Around 5,000 of Vodafone's stores are in Europe, with the remainder in markets such as Asia and Africa. Customer service offered by Apple and Amazon had changed expectations, and Vodafone hopes to improve its services faster than former incumbent rivals like BT, Deutsche Telekom and Telefonica with targeted and personalised marketing, he said.
- Reuters
Vodafone to close more than 1,000 stores
Vodafone will shut 15% of its 7,700 stores and upgrade some of the remaining outlets as customers buy more online and change their expectations of in-store shopping, chief executive Nick Read said on Tuesday. Around 5,000 of Vodafone's stores are in Europe, with the remainder in markets such as Asia and Africa. Customer service offered by Apple and Amazon had changed expectations, and Vodafone hopes to improve its services faster than former incumbent rivals like BT , Deutsche Telekom and Telefonica with targeted and personalized marketing, he said.
- Reuters
Vodafone to reduce store footprint by 15% - CEO
Vodafone will reduce its store footprint by 15%, chief executive Nick Read said on Tuesday, as the telecoms firm makes better use of data to optimise its store estate. Vodafone has around 5,000 stores in Europe.
- Reuters - UK Focus
CORRECTED (OFFICIAL)-Vodafone to reduce store footprint by 15% - CEO
Vodafone will reduce its store footprint by 15%, chief executive Nick Read said on Tuesday, as the telecoms firm makes better use of data to optimise its store estate. Vodafone has around 5,000 stores in Europe.
- Fool.co.uk
The Vodafone share price: is it worth buying for the dividend?
Should you look past Vodafone's growth problems and buy the stock for its dividend instead? This Fool weighs up the options.
- Reuters
Vodafone tests new network tech in UK in challenge to 'big three' suppliers
Vodafone is testing innovative open access radio technology in Britain - a first for Europe - in a move that could break the grip Huawei, Ericsson and Nokia hold on the telco equipment market. OpenRAN, which has been developed by Vodafone and Intel, standardizes the design of hardware and software in the infrastructure, masts and antennae that make up the radio access network that carries mobile calls and data. Vodafone, the world's second largest mobile operator, has trialled the technology in laboratories in South Africa and deployed it in Turkey to deliver 2G and 4G services to customers in both urban and rural areas.
- Reuters - UK Focus
German regulator annuls Vodafone charges for mobile clients
Germany's BNetzA network regulator on Monday said it had annulled a charge Vodafone imposes on other providers if clients decide to keep their previous phone number, a move that could also affect other telecoms operators in Germany. The regulator said that it had set a new maximum threshold for the costs operators are allowed to charge on each other if clients carry on their numbers and that Vodafone's prices were too high. "The now imposed prices have been determined through a Europe-wide comparison," the regulator said, adding that all telecoms providers needed to comply with the new price limit.
- Fool.co.uk
Should I buy the Vodafone share price, up almost 30% in 2 months?
Will this deal transform Vodafone’s prospects and help the firm return to growth?
