South Africa’s Telkom posts 25% jump in half-year earnings

JOHANNESBURG: South Africa’s Telkom reported a 25.4% rise in half-year earnings on Tuesday, boosted by its mobile business, which benefited from increased demand from people working from home and online schooling.

The partly state-owned landline and mobile operator said headline earnings per share, the main profit measure in South Africa, rose to 2.19 rand ($0.1421) in the six months ended Sept. 30 from 1.74 rand in the comparable period last year.

The telecoms sector has been one of the biggest winners of a nationwide lockdown imposed to curb the spread of coronavirus with telcos seeing a spike in data traffic as millions were forced to work, school and entertain themselves from home.