Telefonica reported third-quarter revenues up 10.8 percent year-on-year to EUR 11.919 billion, as a return to growth in Spain and the takeover in Germany helped offset slowing growth in Brazil. Revenue in its home market increased 0.2 percent to EUR 2.998 billion, the first growth in seven years. Latin America sales rose 8.9 percent to EUR 3.634 billion, but Brazil declined 5.5 percent to EUR 2.736 billion. Germany also contributed to growth after the takeover of E-Plus, with revenue there up 62.4 percent to EUR 1.979 billion. The synergies in Germany helped OIBDA at Telefonica increase 2.9 percent to EUR 3.693 billion.

On an organic basis, both the group’s revenue and OIBDA rose 4.8 percent in Q3. Net profit was still down 1.6 percent to EUR 884 million. In the year to date, capital expenditure rose 8.8 percent to EUR 7.101 billion, while operating cash flow was down 1.3 percent to EUR 3.912 billion. Net debt was reduced by EUR 1.547 billion in the quarter to EUR 49.691 billion, bringing leverage to 2.84x EBITDA.

Assuming the sale of O2 UK goes ahead, leverage would be 2.32x EBITDA, within the company’s year-end target of 2.35x. Telefonica also maintained its other targets for the year, for revenue growth of over 9.5 percent, after 13.5 percent in the first nine months, and a drop of no more than 1.2 percent points in the adjusted OIBDA margin. In the first nine months, the margin was down 1.3 points.

Telefonica ended September with a total 327.196 million connections, up 12.1 percent from a year ago but down by around 2.3 million from June due to prepaid disconnections in Brazil. The mobile subscriber base reached 251.383 million, up 11.6 percent year-on-year and down by almost 2.3 million from June. Fixed broadband customers were up by almost 200,000 in the quarter to 20.946 million, and LTE customers rose by around 5 million to 23.578 million.