SK Telecom reported an 8 percent growth in net profit year-on-year for the three months ending June 30th to 403.3 billion won ($441.4 million). Revenues were 2.8 trillion won (US$3.1 billion), an increase of 7.7 percent year-on-year. This growth was on the back of subscriber growth of 7 percent year-on-year (pretty good in a saturated market). SK Telecom holds 50.5 percent of the South Korean mobile phone market. The profit growth was also due to “healthy mobile Internet service revenue” according to Reuters, although the figure wasn’t broken out—and ARPU for “wireless internet” fell by 2 percent. The results were lowered by increased marketing costs due to an aggressive campaign by competitor KTF (which reported a 37 percent drop in quarterly profit due to its marketing costs, notes CNBC). SK Telecom predicts this year’s EBITDA will be 4 trillion won (US$4.36 billion), down from last year’s 4.2 trillion won. It raised this year’s revenue forecast slightly to 11.3 trillion won.

Denies Sprint Takeover Rumors: SK Telecom has also denied it will participate in a bid to acquire Sprint Nextel. It said it received a proposal but rejected it, reports Bloomberg. SK is seeking growth outside its saturated home market—so I think buying into heavy growth markets such as India or China (it has invested in China) makes more sense. Also, it has the Helio MVNO in the US…

Earnings PDF

• Earnings: SK Telecom Revenue Up 6.75 Percent Year-On-Year