03:15 PM EDT, 04/19/2022 (MT Newswires) -- (On February 3, 2022, BCE announced a 5.1%, or $0.18 per share, increase in the annual common share dividend to $3.68. This has been corrected in the fifth paragraph of the story. A corrected version of follows.) Communications company BCE (BCE.TO, BCE) on Thursday reported Q4 2021 revenue of $6.2 billion, up 1.8% from Q4 2020's $6.1 billion, but just below a Capital IQ average forecast of $6.22 billion. The increase was driven by a 3% increase in service revenue but product revenue fell 4.5% to $966 million, due to fewer mobile device transactions and lower business wireline data equipment sales. Net earnings were $658 million, $0.69 per share, a near 30% drop from Q4 2020's earnings of $889 million, or $0.98 per share. The decreases were mainly due to a one-time gain from the sale of Bell data centres to Equinix in Q4 2020 of $211 million. Adjusted earnings were $692 million, down 5.3% from Q4 2020's $731 million, while adjusted EPS was $0.76, beating analysts' expectations for $0.73. BCE had reported adjusted EPS of $0.81 last year. BCE capital expenditures were $1.46 billion, versus $1.49 billion in Q4 2020, corresponding to a capital intensity of 23.5%, from 24.5% in Q4 2020. This brought total 2021 capital expenditures to $4.84 billion , up from $4.2 billion the year before, for a capital intensity of 20.6% versus18.4% in 2020. The year-over-year increase in capital spending is consistent with BCE's 2-year program to accelerate the rollout of Bell's 5G, fibre and rural Wireless Home Internet networks, the company said. The telco also announced a 5.1%, or $0.18 per share, increase in the annual common share dividend to $3.68. BCE also provided its 2022 guidance: Revenue growth of between 1% to 5%; and Adjusted EPS growth of between 2% to 7%; and Free cash flow growth of between 2% to 10%. Price: 73.12, Change: +0.01, Percent Change: +0.01 |