A little like oom really from my point of view - I believe they are the favoured company within their sector and despite the markets - Oftel and the G3 nonsense they will climb back. They pay a divi and this wioll be seen to be increasingly important in the days to come. They have new management and are looking to enhance shareholder value .....

I hold and swing trade a few and not adverse to intraday trading them.

ains


BT in web-based investor relations drive

London, February 7 2003, (netimperative)



by Chris Lake

BT is launching a web-based scheme which it hopes will improve communications with its retail shareholders and help cut costs.


Dubbed 'ShareholderPlus', the system allows investors to sign up and receive BT communications - such as reports, news releases, mandates and, subject to a change in the law, electronic tax vouchers - by email, rather than by post.

BT said this will help it achieve cost savings - by not having to print and despatch reports - and pointed out that it is also good for the environment.

Furthermore, it has negotiated a number of deals with companies such as Virgin Wines, Apollo Travel, RSA and National Car Rental, to market the service and said it will add new offers in the future if it proves to be a success.

BT claims to be one of the first FTSE100 companies to launch such a programme, though it is likely that more will follow.

www.btplc.com/shareholderplus

172 now...1% revenue growth,badly recieved my market.

real chance this will retest its lows in the 150's now.i'd imagine there will be broker downgrades tomorrow morning.

I think you will find the brokers have already made their comments ....

ainsoph

169 now...their comments musn't be much good.You have been tipping this from 9.Why ?

I never tip any share and we started the thread @ 176p

did you read this dreamer - 'I hold and swing trade a few and not adverse to intraday trading them'

How many alises do you have now?



ains




BT seeks to calm fears on pension deficit, reports Q3 profit up 37 pct
LONDON (AFX) - BT Group Plc, the UK's dominant telecom company, sought to allay investor fears about its widening pension deficit.

But many brokers argued BT will need to pay more than its current 200 mln stg a year as a pension top-up to cover the shortfall.

And they also highlighted a weaker than expected 1 pct rise in third quarter revenue.

The company also reported a 37 pct rise in third quarter underlying profits to 521 mln stg, above stock market forecasts centred on 500 mln.

BT revealed its pension funds face a potential deficit of more than 1.5 bln stg - nearly 10 times the shortfall it had just three years ago.

The company has been hit by a combination of a huge slump in equity prices and new accounting rules.

At the end of March last year BT had 71 pct of its pension fund assets in equities, then worth 19.2 bln stg.

Analysts estimate their value could have fallen by up to 5 bln stg by the year-end.

But finance director Ian Livingston said he saw no need to increase the current 200 mln stg annual top-up it is paying into the scheme.

"We have said previously we did not expect the 200 mln a year to change significantly and on the basis of the work the actuary has done to date we have got no reason to change that position," said Livingston.

But many analysts think 200 mln stg will not be enough.

Broker Merrill Lynch, in a research note, raised its EPS and dividend forecasts but still felt it necessary to increase its projected pension top-up payments needed by the company by 50 mln stg a year to 350 mln.

Merrill said BT's results "tell a familiar tale", with revenues weaker than it had anticipated, but EPS better.

BT reported profit before taxation, goodwill amortisation and exceptional items of 521 mln stg for the three months to Dec 31 2002, up 37 pct on the same three months a year earlier.

Group turnover of 4.701 bln stg was up just 1 pct over the same period.

According to an AFX poll of 8 brokers' forecasts, an underlying pretax profit of 460-530 was expected, giving a consensus of 500 mln. That compares with a 381 mln stg profit last time.

Revenues of 4.7 bln to 4.83 bln stg were expected, up some 2.2 pct on the same quarter a year ago.

The group said net debt was reduced by 195 mln stg to 12.9 bln stg at Dec 31 2002, but it received 2.6 bln stg from the sale of its stake in Cegetel to Vivendi in January.

The company aims to get its net debt below 10 bln stg.

BT also revealed record broadband sales in January, in excess of 25,000 per week, giving it a total customer base of over 650,000 as of Feb 7 2003.

Chief executive Ben Verwaayen said the group was on track to hit its 6 mln DSL subscribers target by mid-2006.

But some analysts view the target as challenging due to fierce competition from cable operators. tim.farrand@afxnews.com

i would say your intraday trading would be good !

Stars back BT as it dismisses pensions threat
Published: 16:24 Thr 13 Feb 2003
By Gavin Lumsden, Editor in Chief


(Update) There are no less than eight of our favourite fund managers backing BT right now despite today's fears of its ballooning pension fund deficit - read on to find out who they are.


BT today shrugged off worries about its ballooning pension fund deficit and insisted it was growing in all the right areas.

Ben Verwaayen, BT's chief executive who has been in the hot seat for a year now, said today that in spite of having to re-think his ambitious targets for 6-8% revenue growth in his first three years of office, he was if anything more optimistic than ever about BT's prospects.

'If anything I have to scale up not down expectations,' said Verwaayen, having found a responsive, innovative company that is working smarter and has lots of opportunities in Europe, he said. 'I am very optimistic,' he added.

Trading aside, one major concern for investors has been the company's pension fund deficit. BT (BT.A) is not alone in having a hefty deficit, as GlaxoSmithKline proved yesterday with a 1.3 billion funding gap and Barclays' admission today that its scheme would show up 1.3 billion short on incoming FRS17 accounting standard.

BT's actuary is in the process of carrying out the triennial valuation of the pension scheme, and on a preliminary view based on the current SSAP 24 basis, the deficit looks like being between 1 billion and 1.5 billion, compared to 0.2 billion in March 2000.

The news knocked the shares down nearly 12p, or 6.5%, at 171.25p.

Since 2000, BT has been paying in 200 million a year to the fund, and industry watchers have been expecting this sum to rise to at least 300 million. However group finance director Ian Livingston said he did not expect any 'substantial change' from the current 200 million level, and reminded investors that the 200 million was tax deductible so would cost BT only 70% of the cash paid in.

BT reported revenues for the third quarter to December up just 1% to 4.7 billion, although pre-tax profits were up 37% at 521 million and earnings per share were up 71% at 4.1p. Net debt, which hit a critical 20 billion a couple of years ago, was down a further 195 million to 12.9 billion at December, and decreased further in January with the receipt of the 2.6 billion proceeds from the sale of BT's holding in French operator Cegetel. This was the 26% holding that Vodafone had hoped to pick up, but which was pre-empted by Vivendi.

Verwaayen said today's figures were 'really excellent results,' especially when you look underneath the 1% overall growth to figures such as consumer revenues which are growing for 'the first time in many, many years,' strong corporate business growth and broadband orders hitting some 25,000 a week last month.

The main factors behind the flat revenues were the decline in global carrier turnover due to lost business from AT&T and WorldCom following the winding up of BT's Concert joint venture with the two US giants.

Verwaayen stressed the importance of growing 'profitable revenues', rather than revenue for revenue's sake, and said 'where it is important revenue, we are growing.'

Capital expenditure is expected to be some 2.6 billion for this year, and will be between that figure and 3 billion going forward.

Verwaayen said it was important to invest to deliver future growth. The company has also seen cost cutting slightly ahead of plan, and Verwaayen said it has been improving processes. 'Cost cutting means doing the same for less money,' said Verwaayen, and he said BT was working smarter and improving operations.

He is particularly pleased with the progress of broadband, where the numbers are 'fantastic,' some 650,000 users by last week, and highlighted also large corporate sales, and successes in BT Ignite.

He acknowledged that in the small business and residential markets, BT has faced tough competition from virtual operators and carrier pre-select, which had a 'major impact' on business revenues. However he said BT's response in the business market is BT Business Plan, launched last month, which guarantees a ceiling of 10p on national and local business calls and rewards loyalty.

He also maintains that when competitors quote better prices than BT in the retail market, they are quoting BT's standard charges, where some 10 million BT customers now take packages such as BT Together, which offer 'absolutely competitive' prices.

As to the outlook for the next year or so, Verwaayen said that in such an uncertain market, everyone is looking for certainties. 'We have the capability to keep growing where it matters,' he said.

Livingstone also said the company would maintain its 'progressive dividend policy, while continuing to generate cash and reduce debt. 'We can now do all three,' he said.

Citywire Verdict:

There are many good jokes about actuaries but here is one that investors in big companies like BT might like to consider as the issue of pension scheme funding comes to the fore.

An actuary is someone who'd rather be completely wrong than approximately right.

On the face of it BT's actuarial advice seems reassuring but that does not mean the problem of pension deficit will not return to haunt the company and its shareholders.

Nevertheless, on balance, we are inclined to give BT the benefit of the doubt. In this market there is no share that does not have issues and risks.

With the dividend set to get interesting again and its recovery well in place BT looks highly attractive. It is also encouraging to see that the stock is held by no less than eight star fund managers, all rated a top AAA by Citywire for their excellent risk-adjusted returns over three years. Andrew Green of GAM UK Diversified, Colin Morton of BWD UK Equity Income, Chris Littlejohns' Merrill Lynch UK Income, Edward Bonham Carter in Jupiter Undervalued Assets, Hak Salih of M&G Capital, Stephen Whittaker of New Star UK Growth, Nicholas Purves of St James Equity Income and Neil Woodford in his Invesco Perpetual High Income fund all hold BT as a top 10 holding.

If you need any more incentive Merrill Lynch today said buy with a price target of 230p.

As my colleague Richard Lander - who has tipped in and out of BT successfully recently - said recently there is no such thing a sure bet at the moment. But if you're looking for a longer term investment, BT is a great place to start.

2003 Citywire

"I never tip any share and we started the thread @ 176p
- ainsoph

ha, ha ,ha, ho, ho ,ho, eu huh har har ooooohh, what a wheeze

note: ADVFN threads created by ainsoph

BT will soon be back to 6 11 Aug 01
BT ... down but not out (27 Sep'01)


God, what a loser.

Telegraph gives them as a buy this morning ..... BT that is not the y peeps :-))



worries about a widening pension deficit outweighed broadly better-than-forecast third quarter figures. According to an AFX poll of 8 brokers' forecasts, an underlying pretax profit of 460-530 was expected for the three months ending Dec 31 2002, giving a consensus of 500m. The actual figure came in 37% higher at 521m. Revenue of 4.7 bln to 4.83 bln stg was forecast, up some 2.2% on the same quarter a year ago. But, in fact, revenues rose a slim 0.9%.

Broker Merrill Lynch, in a research note, raised its EPS and dividend forecasts but still felt it necessary to increase its projected pension top-up payments needed by the company by 50m per annum to 350m. Merrill said BT's results "tell a familiar tale", with revenues weaker than it had anticipated, but EPS better. The US broker had expected group revenue growth of 2.2% against BT's reported 0.9%. However, it noted the primary weakness was in Ignite, BT's business services unit, and was encouraged that the core voice business remained encouragingly robust. BT's EBITDA was 2.5% ahead of Merrill's forecast, thanks to quicker than expected cost-cutting, leading to the group's underlying EPS of 4.1 pence some 4.9% ahead consensus. This led Merrill to raise its 2003 EPS estimate by 4.1 pct, with its 2004 expectation upped by 3.5%. The broker also upped its dividend expectation for 2003 to 6.1 pence from 5.9. Merrill said its expectation of an increased pension top up payment was more than offset by lower levels of forecast capital expenditure, leading Merrill to increase its free-cashflow forecasts by 21% in 2003, 16% in 2004 and 7% in 2005. "In the near term we continue to believe that the potential for further cost and capex reductions outweighs the longer-term risks inherent in BT's business model," Merrill said in a morning note to clients. It repeated a target price of 230 pence per BT share.

Broker Cheuvreux said it expects further funding contributions of 1.6 bln stg spread over the next 10 years to cover the pension shortfall. "This won't remove pension concerns, but we believe the share price is discounting 3-4 bln stg additional funding, in other words is at the conservative end of expectations," said the broker in a research note. Cheuvreux described BT's results as mediocre. "More reassuringly Ignite was the weak division rather than the traditional businesses," said the broker in a research note.

...for a business with BT's utility profile, the dividend is miserly. Its prospective dividend yield of about 3.4 per cent is below the UK market average. It should rise as BT's payout rate shifts from around 43 per cent to 50 per cent, and earnings rise. But for now - with BT facing the prospect of slow long-term growth and ongoing fears over the pension fund deficit - it should not be enough to tempt investors.

Surely after the past few years you must realise that analysts dont know their arse from their elbows.

This company is a complete basket case and its only its monopoly position has kept it from imploding.

They offloaded debt onto the poor succker shareholders at OOM and are still massively in debt.

The published headline figures are nonsense and take a good luck at the balance sheet.

Growth will soon go negative as competition bites and the pension defecit is horrendous.

As somone put BT is not a telecoms operator it is a badly run hedge fund.

Not only that it is a badly run utility and it is still priced as a tech stock.

Of course analysts are upgrading it as they own a shed load of stock and need mugs to bid it up so they can offload it

At this time I am tracking with a view to buying - so not over keen on talking them up :-)) 168p on offer currently



ains

News - February 14,2003
BT Criticised Over DSL Campaign Cost

By:mark.j @ 10:08:AM BT has defended itself against allegations that the cost of its broadband subscriber push was too high:

BT said the additional customers could not be measured against the amount spent as the campaign was designed to stimulate take-up over several years.

The TV commercials were meant to create generic awareness of broadband the company added. "Between September and December the advertising was very intensive to kick-start the campaign and we will reap the benefits for a long time to come," a BT spokesman said.

We're not bothered so long as more people are registering for ADSL and thus increasing coverage. More in The Scotsman newspaper.

TELECOMS giant BT has confirmed that it is considering establishing call centres in India, where labour costs are lower.

BT described the prospect of lower costs stemming from a transfer of jobs as "compelling".

However, the firm has described as "wide of the mark" union claims that 8400 jobs were being relocated to the sub-continent.

A BT spokesman said: "It is true that we are considering whether to establish contact centres in India but we have not made a final decision and the figures for job losses claimed by the union are completely wide of the mark, even if we were to proceed."

A spokesman for the Communication Workers Union, which represents a high proportion of BT workers, said: "We fear that over 8400 UK-based jobs could be moved to India."

About 40,000 people work in more than 200 call centres in Scotland.

The possibility of BT opening call centres in India emerged as the group unveiled a 1.5billion deficit in its pension funds. The pension shortfall update emerged with third-quarter profit figures yesterday which revealed a 37 per cent hike to 521million in the three months to December 31.

A spokesman for BT said: "We would stress that, whatever decision is reached, we would not destroy BT jobs in the UK, only to recreate them in India... Anyone who wanted to stay with BT would be able to do so."

But the union, as well as campaigning against the move simply to try to save jobs here, has cited security issues associated with such a move.

"In these troubled times what government would allow a company to expose the details of the millions of customers contained in BTs database to any foreign nationals?

"We must make the public aware of these issues to gain their support in persuading BT and the many other companies who use outsourcing as a way to inflate their profits to stop this exploitation of workers in other countries."

Scottish Hydro-Electric have announced they are to start trialing broadband delivery over power lines in an effort to assess the commercial potential of offering such a service on a more widespread basis.

The company has stated that it is now fully convinced of its technological ability to deliver 2Mbps broadband over existing power cables, and has ironed out the security issues faced by its rival, Norweb.

recovering a little now and up on the day as volumes pick up :-))

BT insists it will hit no-frills broadband target
15:08 Friday 14th February 2003
Graeme Wearden


Rumours that BT Retail is set to miss a key broadband goal are wide of the mark says the company, which believes it can still hit the magic number
BT said on Friday it was confident that it will have sold at least 500,000 subscriptions to its no-frills broadband package by this summer, despite speculation that the target may be too ambitious to be achieved.

A BT spokesman told ZDNet UK News that the rate of take-up of BT Broadband is still growing strongly and is now close to 10,000 new users per week.

With a marketing campaign planned for the second quarter of 2003, Pierre Danon, chief executive of BT Retail, has said he still believes the goal of gaining at least half a million BT Broadband subscribers by this summer is attainable.

In its latest financial results, published on Thursday, BT said weekly sales of BT Broadband are "now exceeding 7,500", and in a press release put out this week announcing a deal with Yahoo! BT disclosed that it now has "over 100,000" BT Broadband customers.

Some in the industry have speculated that these figures indicate that BT Retail will fall short of hitting its 500,000 target, pointing out that at 7,500 new subscribers per week it will take a whole year to add another 400,000 users.

According to BT Retail, though, the picture is actually more rosy.

"Customer growth is now closer to 10,000 per week and the total user base is now significantly more than 100,000. We're still gaining momentum and are confident the 500,000 users target will be hit," explained a BT Retail spokesman.

BT Broadband, unlike most broadband packages, does not include features such as an email account, Web space or any security packages. Instead, customers must get these features from third-parties.

BT is expected to unveil a range of products and applications to be used with BT Broadband this year, including possibly a 'home monitoring' product.

Well I added a few yesterday morning and covering my costs and a little extra


ains

A couple of interesting items from the S Times ..... should help the bottom line in near future




February 16, 2003

BT reconnects with mobile users
Paul Durman



ONLY 15 months after the demerger of its MMO2 mobile-phone business, BT Group is planning a serious assault on the consumer mobile market.
The telecoms giant is working towards a summer launch of a new operation to attract large numbers of mobile-phone users. It is expected that BT will seek to offer a package of fixed and mobile telephony, including text messaging from fixed phones.

BT will tomorrow announce a deal with the British arm of T-Mobile, which will provide the necessary network capacity. T-Mobiles network already carries calls for Virgin Mobile, which it co-owns.

Pierre Danon, chief executive of BT Retail, said: I think theres an emerging market in convergence, with people having fixed and mobile lines and wanting unified services.

Harris Jones, the departing head of T-Mobile UK, said: Its very clear that BT is very aggressive about re-entering the mobile space.

He suggested the new BT initiative would be seeking millions of customers. Increasing competition and loss of traffic to mobile phones has put BT under pressure to find new sources of revenue.

BT is already a large mobile service provider to businesses, buying network capacity from MMO2, its former subsidiary.




February 16, 2003 Extracts only

Broadband shines amid the telecoms gloom
The number of homes and firms with high-speed internet access is 1.5m and rising, says Paul Durman



THE gloom in the telecoms industry often seems unremitting. A savage decline in prices and confidence has pushed many companies into financial ruin, and wrecked the hopes of most of those that survive.

It is somehow fitting that 3, aka Hutchison 3G, the company blazing the trail for 3G in Europe, will not be exhibiting at Cannes: it is still tinkering with the software that powers the video phones it hopes to launch next month.

Yet look beyond the gloom and there is a revolution going on. Internet usage continues to grow apace and, in Britain, as in much of the developed world, there is increasingly widespread adoption of broadband high-speed connections that open up new possibilities for entertainment and business use.

Keith Woolcock, an analyst with Nomura International. Theres something big happening, and its called broadband, he says.

Last week BT announced that it is signing up 25,000 customers a week for its broadband service. Including those who use AOL, Freeserve and other access providers, BT now claims 650,000 broadband subscribers, each of them paying at least 27 a month, and is well on course to hit its target of 1m by this summer.

The cable-television companies, NTL and Telewest, also offer broadband, although a different variety known as cable modem. Between them, the cable companies have about 800,000 broadband customers. After a slow start, Britain now has nearly 1.5m homes and small businesses with broadband facilities.

Browsing websites using a broadband connection is a much quicker and more pleasant experience than with a traditional dial-up connection. It is less frustrating, and users are inclined to spend more time on the internet.

Gavin Patterson, managing director of Telewests consumer division, says: People are just doing more of what they did before. Time online is about four times what it was in the dial-up world. Some people are spending more time online than theyre spending on TV. Theres more chat, theres more e-mailing, more photography, more web-browsing. And it is made for the adult market.

The 10 most popular websites among Telewests Blueyonder broadband customers include seven that offer adult entertainment.


At the most basic level, broadband enables you to e-mail large documents that were simply too big to send over a dial-up connection. This potentially allows more people to work from home, saving on transport and congestion costs.

Even more exciting, broadband believers claim the technology will transform the role of the computer, pushing it into the space previously occupied by the television and the hi-fi system.

Early subscribers are already using broadband to exchange music files an illegal phenomenon embraced by tens of millions of users that has caused the collapse of the American singles market.

Patterson says broadband could finally make video-on- demand a reality. Instead of just watching whats on television, viewers could search the web for the particular programme or film that they wished to see perhaps a favourite show broadcast years ago, that someone has digitised and stored on a computer. Patterson says: There are great opportunities for broadband, both in breadth of content and in depth.

Computer games are another big driver of broadband take-up. Faster data flow allows gamers to play their friends in other cities, or even other countries. And in the near future, a simultaneous voice connection will allow gaming rivals to taunt and jeer one another.

BT and the cable companies are looking forward to the British launch next month of Microsofts Xbox Live, which will allow gamers to use their consoles to play games online without having to buy them.

Woolcock argues that the huge corporate investment in technology over the past decade and more was spurred on by the spread of network computing. With many companies now reining back expenditure, he says the real opportunity for broadband lies in the consumer market.

Pierre Danon, chief executive of BT Retail, is not so sure of the extent of consumer demand for broadband.

He is confident that BT can reach 1m or perhaps 2m customers, but he points out that most of these are already heavy internet users. These people, who spend a large amount each month for their internet usage, can easily be persuaded to spend a little more for a much better product, he believes.

Danon says it will be much harder to convert the occasional internet user, who goes online only to do some shopping or to send e-mail. If you spend just 5 a month for your rarely used dial-up connection, why would you spend 27 a month for broadband? Danon says a target of around 5m is not completely stupid, but it is very difficult. I believe the No 1 battle is the battle (to offer) value-added services.

One example is BTs recent partnership with Yahoo, which will provide junk e-mail controls, instant messaging, parental controls, digital photo storage and anti-virus software.

He also speaks highly of a deal with Pixology, a digital- printing firm that will provide cheap prints of digital photos.

In addition, BT is championing the British introduction of so-called wi-fi, a short-range wireless technology that offers much faster data speeds than 3G. Although wi-fi is not truly a mobile technology, the cheap base stations required will allow a roll-out to hotels, coffee shops, airports and train stations where businessmen might stop to check e-mail on their laptops.

Royal Bank to call in BT Group
16 February 2003, Mail on Sunday

PHONES giant BT has clinched a deal, thought to be worth at least 500 million, to run the telecoms systems at Royal Bank of Scotland. The contract is likely to be announced this week and will see the company take over the running of all telecoms systems at RBS for about 50 million a year for the next ten years.

BT ratings to stand despite pensions gap FT

Ainsoph: if you're going to paste all this stuff, I really think you should say where you are cutting it from. Unattributed articles are not of much value.

The key facts about the pension fund seem to me to be contained in this snippet from today's FT article:

"Analysts at UBS Warburg estimate BT's FRS 17 pension deficit to be close to 9.5bn - the high end of estimates - and on that basis this would push BT's lease-adjusted debt obligations from 13.4bn to 22.9bn. BT has one of the largest UK pension funds, with assets of 27bn as of last March."

UBSW's estimate may be at the high end, but if the fund has assets of 27bn a deficit of 9.5bn seems quite plausible, with the equity market down almost 50% (and bearing in mind that the equity portion of the BT fund will almost certainly have underperformed the market).

9bn is more than half of BT's market capitalisation. Even without taking this into account, BT has negative shareholders' funds. This may be another great British disaster in the making.