MTN Group Ltd. (MTN), Africa’s largest mobile-phone operator, missed analysts’ earnings estimates as currency shifts and declines in airtime and subscription revenue held back first-half profit growth. Adjusted first-half earnings per share rose to 4.70 rand from 4.39 rand a year earlier, Johannesburg-based MTN said today in a statement. That missed the 5.05-rand average of six analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg. Net income increased to 9.45 billion rand ($1.3 billion) from 8.1 billion rand, while revenue rose 1 percent to 56.5 billion rand. First-half subscriber numbers gained by 7.5 percent, slower than MTN’s full-year target of a 22 percent increase, while airtime and subscription sales fell 2.8 percent. MTN, which operates in 21 African and Middle Eastern markets, said revenue growth was hampered by the rand’s gain against the dollar and the Nigerian naira’s drop versus the U.S. currency. The company is upgrading networks to so-called third- generation technology to handle more data traffic as consumers seek Internet connections on their mobile devices. MTN said it will spend 22.2 billion rand to increase data and voice capacity. “We expect to step up the pace of rollout in the second half of the year” to make up for delays in equipment delivery, Chief Executive Officer Sifiso Dabengwa said in the statement. MTN fell as much as 2 percent to 134.20 rand and was down 1.2 percent as of 9:53 a.m. in Johannesburg trading. That pared the stock’s gain this year to 0.7 percent. To contact the reporter on this story: Sikonathi Mantshantsha in Johannesburg at smantshantsh@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Kenneth Wong at kwong11@bloomberg.net

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