Good morning. My name is Drew, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everybody to the América Móvil Q2 2022 conference call and webcast. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be Q&A question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press Star followed by one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press the Star key followed by two. Thank you. Now I will turn the call over to Ms. Daniela Lecuona, Head of Investor Relations.
Hi. Thank you. Good morning, and good morning to everyone. Thank you for joining us today to discuss our Q2 financial and operating results. We have on the line Mr. Daniel Hajj, CEO, and Mr. Carlos García Moreno, CFO.
Thank you, Daniela. Good morning, everyone. Carlos is gonna make a summary of the Q2 of 2022 financial and operating report.
Yeah. Thank you, Daniel. Good morning, everyone. The trend towards higher interest rates in the US dollar market that began in March continued unabated in the Q2 , a reflection to the dominant sentiment, with both short and long-term interest rates rising. By the second week of June, long-term rates peaked and began a downward trend as markets shifted the focus towards the negative impact on economic activity that would be derived from substantially higher short-term interest rates. By the end of the quarter, the dollar had appreciated intermittently against our regional operations, including the Mexican peso, the Argentine peso, the Colombian peso, and the euro. In the end of June, with 306 million wireless subscribers after incorporating 12.9 million subscribers from the acquisition of OI in Brazil.
Organically, we had net additions of 6.1 million, which includes 1.8 million postpaid subscribers, and Brazil led the way in terms of postpaid growth, having added 1,039 thousand subscribers, followed by Colombia with 272 ,000. We gained in the quarter 1.3 million prepaid subscribers, of which approximately 350 thousand came from Mexico and Colombia, both of them more or less equal, and 257 ,000 from Brazil. In the fixed line segment, we connected 186 thousand broadband accesses, of which half came from Brazil, 38 thousand from Eastern Europe, 25,000 from Central America, and 20,000 from Mexico.
In terms of profit growth, mobile postpaid was the main driver of growth at 10.9%, followed by mobile prepaid at 4.2%, and fixed broadband at 2.5%. Our fixed line voice and Pay TV accesses continued to decline on a year-on-year basis, although the fourth month seems to be on an improving trend. Our revenue reached MXN 217.4 billion in the quarter, 3.3% more than in the year and the quarter in Mexican peso terms, with net service revenue expanding 4.5%. At constant exchange rates, the latter increased 4.9%. This total is excluding Argentina because of its high inflation rates. It's 4.9% between the impact from the incorporation of former OI clients and revenue from May first.
Including that effect, service revenues were up 4.2%, excluding that effect. Both prepaid and postpaid revenue growth rates were similar in the quarter, approximately 8.5% once the OI clients are taken into account. With 20% mobile service revenue growth, 13.7% without OI, Brazil was our top performer, as our Eastern European operations posted 9.6% growth, Mexico 8.8%, Peru 7.5%, Dominican Republic 6.9%, and Austria 6.6%. Broadband revenue was up 3.3%, a similar pace to that of the Q1 , where corporate network revenue growth increased to 8.9% from 4.9% in the prior quarter.
The decline in Pay TV revenue moderated somewhat to -5.6%, mostly on account of improvements in Brazil. The top performers in broadband revenue expansion were the Dominican Republic at 16%, Eastern Europe at 11.3%, and Puerto Rico at 10.1%. This slide does not include Argentina because of its high inflation. Nonetheless, it must be pointed out that Argentina is exhibiting the fastest access growth in this area. Q2 EBITDA totaled MXN 82.7 billion, a 4% increase in nominal terms, and 4.2% at constant exchange rates, with EBITDA margin rising 0.2% to 38%. EBITDA expanded 10.3% in our Eastern European operations, 8.8% in Brazil, 8.6% in Dominican Republic, and 5.6% in Mexico.
Our operating profit of MXN 41 billion in the quarter resulted in a net income of MXN 13.7 billion after comprehensive financing costs of MXN 18 billion, which approximately half were net interest payments. Throughout the H1 of the year, our operating cash flow, which already reflects our working capital requirements, fully covered our capital expenditures in the amount of MXN 55.6 billion. We raised MXN 43.8 billion in equity and debt deals, accepted funds MXN 19.6 billion for the previous sale, and a price adjustment related to [inaudible] platform and MXN 11.6 billion in labor obligations. Shareholder distributions of MXN 16.3 billion in share buybacks were partially funded by MXN 2.2 billion in dividend income from our KPN and Verizon stakes.
Given the criticality of our working capital requirements, we foresee a reduction in the H2 of the year. Our net debt excluding leases stood at MXN 414.7 billion at the end of June, a MXN 7.1 billion increase relative to December. It was equivalent to 1.36 times net debt to LTM EBITDA. Approximately MXN 55 billion in debt obligations will be transferred to Sitios Latinoamérica upon its spin-off from América Móvil. We are pretty much expecting it to take place in this Q3 . With that, I would like to pass the floor back to Daniel for Q&A. Thank you, Carlos.
Thank you. We can now begin the question and answer session.
At this time, I would like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, please press star then the number one on your telephone keypad. We'll pause.
We don't hear you.
Apologies. At this time, I would like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, press star then the number one on your telephone keypad. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. Our first question is from Alejandro Gallostra. Your line is going to be opened shortly. Your line is now open, Alejandro. Go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Good morning, Daniel, Carlos, Daniela. I have a couple of questions about Brazil. The first one is about the mobile business. We have seen the company reporting stable ARPU in Brazil on a sequential basis following the integration of all SIM subscribers, although I expect the ARPU to decline slightly in the new subscriber mix. Could you please explain what is behind your achieving ARPU in Brazil this quarter? This is my first question. Thank you.
We don't hear you very well. Can you repeat it, please? Because we don't hear you very well.
Sure, I'll repeat the question. It's about the mobile business in Brazil.
Yes.
Since we have seen the company reporting stable ARPU in the country on a sequential basis following the integration of all its mobile subscribers, although I expect the ARPU to decline slightly on the new subscriber mix. I was wondering if you could explain what is behind the resilient ARPU in Brazil this quarter.
Oh, nothing new. I think, you know what we have this quarter in Brazil. In Brazil, we grow part because we get the subscribers from OI, around 12 million subscribers, four and something on postpaid and the rest in the prepaid. The organic growth besides OI was very good. Around 14% is what we have. We have a very good subscriber base. We still are doing our combos. We are also having a very good network. Number portability is, we're gaining subscribers in number portability. Overall, I think we are doing a very good job in the prepaid and postpaid subscribers in Brazil, and that's why the ARPU is stable this quarter.
Sure.
As you point out, Alejandro, I think that, you know, we had already had a slight increase in ARPU in the Q1 , and this is basically continuing in the Q2 . It's a little bit higher. Yes, it is the final numbers, even after the incorporation of the old sites.
Yes.
We're having a 2.1% increase in ARPU to MXN 22.
Okay, great. Thank you. My second question is related to the fixed telecom business in Brazil. Since a few days ago, the CEO of Claro Brazil described a difficult competitive environment in the fixed broadband market in the country, mentioning a high household penetration and market prices that do not provide an adequate financial return from this business segment in his view, obviously. Nevertheless, you and your other firms in Brazil continue rolling out for FTTH in the country. Could you please share with us your views on the competitive environment in broadband?
What are the opportunities and financial returns that you see in the fixed telecom business in Brazil that justify upgrading your cable infrastructure to FTTH in the country? Thank you.
Well, I think I don't know exactly what Félix said, but it's true. The fixed broadband market in the country is a difficult market. We have been having other competitors and a lot of companies putting fiber to the home for the last three years. There's the other competitors. Let's call them the other competitors has been growing. They are regional. The ISPs, a lot of ISPs are over there and putting fiber. I think in our case, we have all the telecom business also. We have broadband, we have TV, we have fixed, and we have corporate, and we have all the corporate applications and new services that we're doing.
For us, it's I think a good business to do fiber, to make the combos, and to grow in the Brazil market. We still have some areas where we haven't had some fiber, and we're putting I think this quarter we entered in 24 cities, new cities in Brazil. We're gonna do it in fiber or in the other side, we're gonna do also 5G, so we have two different ways of giving the broadband. We're gonna start maybe this Q3 to do more 5G in Brazil. With the fiber plus the 5G, I think we have a good telecom service for all the customers. I think it's been a good business for us.
Although what Felix is saying that the broadband market is very competitive, it's true. It's a lot of competition, a lot of ISPs, a lot of regional competitors, but, we're doing okay. I think we have a good penetration in our network. We're penetrating very good all these new homes that we're having, good ARPU. So all overall, we're okay on what we're doing in Brazil.
Okay, great. Thank you, Daniel. Thank you, Carlos.
Thank you. I think the conditions for a company like Claro are different than the conditions for the ISPs in Brazil. We have all the services, we have access to financing. I think it's gonna be different what the rollout what they are starting to do three or four years ago than what they are gonna do the next three years. The financing is gonna be different. Let's see how it's gonna behave in the next years the broadband market in Brazil.
Okay, thank you for your comments.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Alejandro Chavelas from Credit Suisse. Your line is now open. Go ahead, Alejandro.
Hi, thanks for taking the question. Just a couple. The first one on TracFone. Can you tell us what was the pricing adjustment that you mentioned? What was the amount? And also on Sitios Latinoamérica, you seem to be very confident that you can complete it in the next, let's say two months. So why are you so confident? Have you had any feedback from the authorities or something, or have you progressed on any front that leads you to be so optimistic about completing it so soon or in the same timeline?
Yes, on the Sitios Latinoamérica, we are optimistic. The approvals have been advancing as overall in the country. We're optimistic that we can have the spin-off in the Q3 . Yes, that's true. We are optimistic, and things are moving, so that's why we're optimistic. We think that in the Q3 , end of the Q3 , we can have the spin-off done. On the platform, Carlos, I don't know if you want to explain.
Sure. What happened with platform is that, besides the purchase price, there was to be an adjustment that was based on changes in working capital in particular. There was an expected change because the closing of platform took place in the middle of the month. It was, I think, the twenty-third of November, if I recall correctly. There was an adjustment that was estimated. Based on that adjustment, we received an additional amount beyond the stated purchase price. This additional amount eventually, you know, was basically given back because, by the time that we have been doing financials, the complete financials, it seemed that the estimate was much more accurate.
It's basically given back.
Okay. I don't know if you mentioned it. I couldn't hear very well, but did you mention what the amount was or
I think it was around $200 million what they give us.
Okay.
We return that.
Always for purchase price and then, we basically.
Return that.
-return.
Great. Thanks so much. Perhaps a follow-up on, I guess in Brazil now on the wireless segment on mobile. I don't know, now that you have successfully integrated the old subscribers, what are you seeing in terms of the competitive environment? Are you already seeing market share? Do you see players will try to win market share or will keep stable market share? What are your thoughts on Brazil in the mobile segment?
We acquired the subscribers. We are moving and making all the adjustments in our infrastructures, in IT and everything. It's gonna take around three, four, five months more to have everything done. What we can see is that in the OI subscribers, we're having positive number portability. We are net gainers on that. There are more OI subscribers that are coming to Claro than leaving Claro. That's more or less what we have been seeing. It's too early to see because they're only one and a half months, maybe two months on that. We're confident at all. At the end of the day, we have a very good network.
We have very good coverage and good speed and the brand is doing very well. In Brazil, as you see the numbers that we have, we are doing very good in wireless in Brazil. That's-
Beyond the OI clients, I think what I mentioned at the beginning is that Viva gained 1.8 million postpays, of which Brazil was the main contributor because Brazil generated nearly 800,000 net additions. This is over and above what we had getting by way of port lines. We are having very good subscribers.
Mm-hmm.
At the same time, we are having an increase in ARPU, which was also good.
Overall, we are executing very well what we need to do on OI and we think that we're gonna get more subscribers in portability than what we're gonna lose. We have a very good quality of the network capacity, good commercial execution. We're doing okay. We're happy the way we're doing wireless in Brazil. The numbers that we're showing say that.
Thank you much for the answers.
Thank you.
Thanks.
Thank you. Our next question comes from Carlos Legarreta from GBM. Carlos, your line is open.
Hi. Thank you. Good morning. Just two quick questions. The first one on CapEx allocation. I just want to confirm that you're maintaining your guidance of MXN 8 billion for the year. Secondly, I guess this is a more general question, but I think it's very commendable that in most of your core countries, say for Colombia, you have managed to expand margins, and this is within the context of inflationary pressures. I guess my question is: How are you managing to do that, given that you are not being aggressive in pricing? That would be my second question. Thank you.
On CapEx, I think we are in the budget that we have, MXN 8 billion plus some frequencies, if we have some frequencies. The CapEx is gonna be MXN 8 billion, around MXN 8 billion for this year, and it's more or less what we had last year and what we are gonna do for the next years. We can add frequencies in that CapEx. On Colombia, it's very interesting. I think in Colombia, for me, the results in Colombia were very good because even though we reduce a little bit our EBITDA, the growth that we have in Colombia was excellent. We do 610,000 net adds in the quarter, 60% more than previous year.
We have 272,000 postpaid subscribers, 340,000 prepaid subscribers. The growth was very good. Of course, that cost us a little bit more in expenses in acquiring the customers. All overall, we beat competition in prepaid in Colombia, postpaid in Colombia, we're doing very good. Wireless all overall, we are doing very good. On the fixed side, we are also not gaining as there's a lot of ISPs over there also. I think we're doing good. We're doing also the combos, the quadruple play, the triple play, and that's bringing us the EBITDA is more than 40%. I think Colombia is doing very good.
Thank you, Daniel, for that color on Colombia. Go ahead, Carlos.
No, I'm just to you know to say that notwithstanding the issues of inflation, as you mentioned, I think we're seeing EBITDA margin increases in Brazil, in Mexico, in Austria, and Eastern Europe. We're seeing it in Peru, et cetera. We're seeing increases in some of the major operations of the company. As Daniel pointed out, Colombia was a large decline, but it's more than accounted for by the increase in
60%.
60% more than the prior year.
No, I mean, I perfectly understand that. I think my question was more directed at how are you achieving to have these margin expansions in these core countries? Like I said, except for Colombia, which I know is a different case.
Mm-hmm.
Because as you can imagine, most of our clients ask if the EBITDA margin expansion will be sustainable in this environment given that you are not fully passing on the burden on inflation through wireless pricing, at least that we're aware.
Yeah. Well, it's the revenues are growing, the revenues are helping, and we have a very strict cost control and expenses taking out expenses. We have something that we call digital transformation, that we're moving a lot of things to do digital, and that is reducing a lot our costs. We have, like, a big policy in América Móvil to do everything through digital, and that's helping us to reduce costs and expenses. It's what we have, and that's why we are increasing our EBITDAs in these core countries.
Thank you, Daniel and Carlos.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Diego Aragao from Goldman Sachs. Diego, your line is now open.
Yes. Thanks. Good morning, everyone. The first question is related to the JV with Liberty Latin America in Chile. Just want to get, you know, the latest on this one. If you don't mind just to provide, you know, what is the status on the regulatory approval, that would be great. Thank you.
No, not too much to say. We're advancing. I think we are doing okay. We are moving with the regulators over there, and I think that we expect that in the fourth quarter we can do the merger. That's more or less the timing that we have.
Thank you. Maybe the second question. Yeah.
Yes. As you know, last month we saw. Yeah, we finished Panama and, as we said in the results.
Sounds good. Thank you. I guess the second question is, actually just a very follow-up, on the previous one regarding TracFone. I'm sorry, I couldn't hear well the answer. Would you mind just to explain again the adjustment that was made? Thank you.
Carlos here. I explained a bit that, besides the purchase price, for TracFone, there was an adjustment to be made based on changes to working capital and other. At the time that we made the closing, which was the middle of the month, we had made an estimate of what this adjustment would be, and we got paid an additional amount over the purchase price for this adjustment. Eventually, by the time that the financial statements were made up and so on, some of these estimates were not correct. And we basically have given back what was advanced as an adjustment payment. That's essentially correct. Okay. Net, America Móvil paid the same purchase price that we had originally.
Okay. Understood. Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Leonardo Olmos from UBS. Leonardo, your line is now open.
Hi. Good morning, everyone. I have two questions on mobile in Brazil. Sorry to go back on the subject, but hopefully.
No.
We can have some fresh discussions on it. Number one, the ICMS change, the tax reduction that happened in Brazil, do you see as an opportunity to increase, maybe share of wallets, to take some of the reduction to your price to increase net revenue? What are your plans there that you can share with us? The second question is regarding what you mentioned before about 5G. In the context of broadband, I'm not sure I got it right, but are you considering FWA for 5G? Do you see that as an option, maybe cheap option? Maybe too expensive because of the equipment costs. How do you see FWA playing out in Brazil? Thank you.
I mean, first the tax that they are talking about, so it's a good opportunity to increase the share of wallet for the people. This is something that we pass to the people, then if we are not gonna pass them to our end customers, then I hope they can buy more data or more megas or something else. So that's something that I think that it can increase our share of wallet within Brazil. That will be important. Now, second, on the fixed broadband, yes, we're gonna do 5G for fixed, and we're gonna do 5G also for wireless. We'll have a program and infrastructure roll out.
Roll out.
Rollout of 5G, and that includes the 5G in the phones and also in fixed. We have, we're still gonna do fiber to other cities in Brazil. As I said, we do 24 new cities in this quarter. We're also gonna do. There's gonna be an alternative for our customers to have 5G in broadband or fiber in broadband, depending on the place, depending on the neighborhood, depending on a lot of things. We can do all the technologies in Brazil. Yes.
That's very interesting. I imagine it's the first company to openly talk about that and that opportunity. Very interesting. Looking forward to hear more about that. Have a good day, everyone. Bye.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from David Joyce from Barclays. David, your line is now open.
Thank you. A couple questions, please. First, you continue to have improving churn trends in a number of countries like Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador. To what would you attribute that, and how much further do you think that, you know, that can improve? Then secondly, if you could just remind us or update us on when you think you'll have 5G fully rolled out in your key markets? Thank you.
Well, I think churn it's a very important indicator. It means that the customers are happy. It means that we're giving good service, good coverage, good quality. We hope, and we're working a lot on having the best networks, the best quality and coverage all around Latin America. I think that's working because, as you said, the churn is being reduced. In Mexico, specifically in Mexico, we already have 40 cities with 5G. It's been doing very well. People likes a lot, and they are part of the increase on ARPU is because people is moving to 5G plans, and 5G plans are giving you more, but you have to pay a little bit more. That's more or less what we're seeing.
I think at the end of maybe Colombia is gonna take a little bit more of time because we don't have the frequencies. Chile a little bit more. The rest, I think we in the main cities, we can have 5G at the end of this year. Mexico, Brazil, we are gonna have at the end of the year a good rollout in 5G. Austria, we already have in Austria. Peru, we already have something in Peru. Depending a lot on the spectrum also. Now depends where, in which countries they are giving a spectrum or selling a spectrum, then we're gonna roll out 5G very fast.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Fred Mendes from Bank of America. Fred, your line is now open.
Hello. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for the call. I have two questions as well. I mean, the first one, again, back to the mobile segment in Brazil. It looks like, in this quarter, you know, once you exclude OI, your ARPU increased by close to 6%. That would imply almost like a double digit pass-through of price in our calculation here. Just wonder if that's the case. If this is the case, if you already seen the benefits from having three players instead of four. I think you already mentioned something close to that in a previous question. That would be my first one. Then my second one, looking at Telmex.
It looks like that over the last quarters, the service revenue has been under pressure. Just wondering if that's a signal due to the higher competition or maybe because now people are returning to work. The demand for the broadband is not as strong as it used to be, and then it's putting some pressure in the recent quarters. Thank you very much.
You know, I think, Fred, that I think you're right. I think ARPUs have been firm on account of the market repair as you see now some consolidation of the market. That have been helping although in the context of very strong inflation that we are seeing currently in Brazil. I think our last number yesterday I think was up to 12%, no? I think we are now saying that it's important to try to keep up with inflation, and this I think this is showing also what we get. What was the second question that I said, sorry?
Well, very clear, Carlos. Thank you. The second question is about Telmex. At least, once you look at the service revenue, on a quarterly basis, it looks like for the last three years the pressures around -3%, and there was a pickup by the end of last year positive. Just wondering if this pressure comes from a higher competition on broadband, or maybe that's just lower demand now that with the supposedly the end of the pandemic, people are returning to work, and then the demand from broadband at home is not as strong as it used to be in 2021.
You know, I think on Telmex, what we're doing is we're running more the fiber. We're moving more subscribers to our fiber network. I think yeah, more than 50, maybe 60% of our subscribers are moving to the fiber that we're rolling out. On broadband, the revenue is growing 3.5%, so we're starting to grow on that. In the corporate segment, I think Telmex is doing very good. That's more or less what we have in Mexico in peak. There's more competition, of course, but we're running more fiber, we're doing more households, and we're moving a lot more subscribers that we have in copper to fiber, and that's giving us a good churn and
I think to add to what I'm really saying, basically, you know, you see broadband revenue growth for Telmex has been quite steady, moving slightly up. It's 3.5% this quarter. Last quarter was 3.1%. The prior one was 3.0%. So it's being steady and improving the last few quarters. What you see is, and it's always indicated with Telmex is, corporate networks business is stronger and it tends to be more volatile. So this quarter it was slightly positive, 0.1%. Prior quarter was -1.4%. The prior quarter was positive 5.5%. So it's a bit more volatile. Steady broadband revenue growth.
Corporate networks is in the aggregate good, but it tends to be more volatile on a quarter-to-quarter basis. What we're seeing is voice revenues. Voice revenues, you know, as Daniel Hajj commented, you're seeing some headwinds in voice revenues, and those will continue to be there. The amount that is left is much less than used to be.
Perfect. Very clear. Yeah, that.
Thank you.
Perfect. Very clear, that. Daniel and Carlos, thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Marcelo Santos. Marcelo, your line is now open.
Hi. Good morning. Thanks for taking my question. I wanted to dig a little bit deeper into the fixed wireless strategy, where you aim to launch broadband using 5G. Which are the countries you aim to launch that? Is the idea to steal clients from legacy networks, or do you think this product will be competitive against fiber players?
No, I think there's no fiber all around Latin America. To start with, we have, like, around 3 million fixed wireless subscribers throughout Latin America. This is not new. We're doing good. It's where they have bad networks, bad broadband networks, or there are no networks in these places. We have these ones in 4G. I think that with 5G, the new boxes, when there's economies of scale and we have good prices on the 5G boxes, 5G would be also a good product for all these places, low densities, no good networks, not fiber, difficult to roll out fiber.
Some people, let's say in Austria, there's a lot of these products because people doesn't want to have cables inside the houses. So they put the box, and then you don't have to cable all the house. So it's a different, it's a new product, and I think it's gonna be very successful in Latin America. We already have around 3 million subscribers in this fixed broadband. It's here, Latin America plus Austria we have.
Perfect. The second question would be about the ICMS in Brazil. You're very clear that you're going to pass that to prices. Are you creating some offer to try to keep somehow that money inside América Móvil? Like,
Something to take advantage that the customer will now have a little bit of savings and try to sell him something extra. Are you creating something specific to try to capture that?
No, we don't have anything specific at this moment. We're working and thinking what will be the best for our customers. We will see what will be the best. No, we still thinking what will be. Overall, if we give or don't give anything to the customer, I think the customer is gonna pay less, and I'm sure that he's gonna spend more in telecom by reducing this ICMS.
Perfect. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Our next question comes from Andrés Coello from Scotiabank. Andrés, your line is now open.
Yes. Thank you for taking my question. If you can give any color on taxes effectively paid in the H1 of the year? I think taxes paid were increased to MXN 31 billion from MXN 16.5 billion last year. Wondering if there is anything extraordinary impacting taxes, like profits connected to the sale of TracFone? Also second question, please. We have seen a certain slowdown in buybacks in the last few weeks. If you can comment on the outlook for buybacks for the rest of the year. Thank you very much.
I think on the indication of the taxes, the effectively paid taxes, what you see for the H1 of this year compared to the H1 of last year is that it is in the H1 . As you know, it's in the first quarter you make the tax payment corresponding to the fiscal year of the past fiscal year. At the beginning of 2021, we had to make these payments for the full taxes of 2020. In 2020 we had quite substantial foreign exchange losses, and that allowed us to offset these losses against taxes.
There was less of a payment of taxes on account of that at the beginning of 2021, as compared to 2022, because in 2022 we haven't had this issue. We didn't have this kind of FX losses during the year 2021. I think. Was that clear?
Yes, thank you. The taxes related to the TracFone, to the sale of TracFone are impacted last year. They were paid in November of last year. They weren't paid this year, the TracFone taxes.
No, I think the TracFone taxes were for the most part paid at the time of the TracFone sale, and that is, that appeared in November. That did not appear in the H1 numbers. What does appear in the H1 numbers
Understood.
The payment of the past fiscal year and we do have, you know, the taxes for the year 2020 are completely different from the taxes of the year 2021 in Mexico, on account of the FX losses of the year 2020.
Understood.
Okay. On the other question had to do with the share buyback and, what's his question?
Correct. Yeah. We've seen a certain slowdown in buybacks in the last few weeks. If you can comment on the outlook for buybacks for the rest of the year? Thank you.
No, I think we don't focus on, you know, a given pace. I think it has a lot to do with the liquidity we have at hand. We have said this is our goal. You know, we will be making our share buyback throughout the year. That's what we've done always, no? It has basically to do with whatever excess cash we expect we will have, having paid our dividends. We are not seeing anything important in M&A. I don't think I'm not buying anything relevant for we've already acquired before, for the H2 of the year. We are not seeing, I haven't seen extraordinary.
Whatever cash that we generated, you know, should allow us to stay where we have said we would stay in terms of leverage and the rest should be distributed to shareholders.
Understood. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you.
Our next question comes from Walter Piecyk from LightShed. Walter, your line is now open.
Thank you. Daniel, I'd just like to quickly follow up on that last comment. I mean, if you look at 2021, the pattern of your share repurchase increased in the H2 of the year. And then it slowed down in the H1 of the year. I realize that you sold TracFone, so you lost some free cash flow, right? From selling TracFone. But is the H1 of this year compared to the H2 of last year in terms of share repurchase activity more a function of the seasonality of how you do distributions to shareholders or share repurchase?
Is it the fact that TracFone dropped out the free cash flow, so you just had a little less free cash flow to spend on share repurchase?
Yeah. Well, I mean, Robert, it's a little bit the same thing as Jose in this prior question. I think we have cash flow throughout the year. We tend to have all things equal, less free cash flow in the H1 of the year than in the H2 . I've mentioned that we, you know, working capital is very seasonal, you know, like roaming. It demands a lot of funds especially for months of the year. And then it tends to normalize throughout the rest of the year. Okay. Typically, H1 tends to be less intense than H2 , you know, all things equal.
We did have more share buybacks the first couple of the year than we had last year, in April, September. So that's key. We're going to have more dividends also this year than last year, no?
Okay. Thank you. Sorry for that. Just to be clear on that. Just one other one. Thanks, Carlos. Just one other one. Just going back to an earlier answer on CapEx. Daniel, you had mentioned that you could still intend to spend $8 billion this year or next year. I mean, the dollar has been very strong against the currencies in all of the markets that you operate. I think a lot of people are concerned about the global economic outlook. At what point, if at all, like, if the dollar continues to strengthen or if the economic outlook gets worse, do you consider maybe paring back on your capital investment, to adjust for what's going on with currency and economic outlook?
I think you are right. We have already done the budget and all the analysis for this year, but we're open to see what's gonna happen next year. Also, depending on the demand, the demand is not so high, then we don't have to put too much capacity. We're gonna be open and, of course, if we don't need it, we're not gonna put CapEx that we don't need. The CapEx that we're putting has to give us some return, and that's what we're looking for. We're open, and we don't have anything done.
What I said is that we have an average of MXN 8 billion, but remember that in 2020 we reduced that because of the pandemic, and then 2021 we do that, 2022 we're gonna do that, but we don't know exactly what's gonna be 2023, and we're open to review that. Yes.
Great. Thank you very much.
One last thing on the distributions, Walter Piecyk. I was saying that even for this year I went up relative to last year. I think it's 10% increase in dividend per share. I suppose for years we are paying everything in one installment in August. Okay? Prior years, we had two installments, one in July, one in November. This time around, it have to be a single installment in August. Yeah.
I appreciate that. My only feedback for that is I think that investors, at least income investors, I think seem to prefer, rather than once a year or one quarter a year, maybe the consideration of a quarterly dividend. I mean, I appreciate everyone loves to see growth in dividends, so that's a very big positive for sure. Maybe a quarterly dividend as opposed to once a year might be, you know, a possibility in the future for 2023. Just a thought.
Yeah. You know, we'll review that and we'll keep you posted.
Thank you. Thanks, Carlos. Appreciate it.
Thank you. Thank you.
Our next question is from Phani Kanumuri from HSBC. Your line is now open.
Thanks for taking my question. I have a couple of questions. The first one is that in the group level, the service growth, the service revenue growth was much higher than EBITDA growth this quarter. But that is something that we have not seen for a long time. Given that the macro remains very difficult, do you see that your EBITDA growth would be, you know, lagging service revenue growth for the rest of the year? That's my first question.
Well, it wasn't too high because the service revenue was 4.9% growth and the EBITDA 4.2% growth. It's not a big difference, no, on that. As we discussed a little bit, also depending the revenue is going well. The EBITDA depends a little bit on cost and expenses, inflation. We have a lot on that in all the countries. Different inflation, different increases in different countries. I think this quarter we maintain very good our EBITDA. I think it's good. We still grow a lot. As I said, in Colombia, it was also 60% growth and that with the 60% growth, we have more cost selling costs and acquisition costs.
I think all overall, our service revenue and our EBITDA have been growing well.
You know, just to mention, we presented it earlier in the slides, maybe you didn't see it, but 4.4% is the EBITDA growth was in line with what we had in last quarter. This corresponds to a margin that is slightly higher than sort of where we were last year at 38%. I think it's little bit higher margin with higher revenues and that's, I guess you, this is growth 4% or more than 4% and it gets you an EBITDA growth of 50%.
Growing well with 3% organically. We have been growing 3.1 million subscribers in the quarter, so we're still growing very well.
The commercial side.
Commercial side, yes.
Okay. Thank you. My second question is regarding, you know, the markets that you're struggling in EBITDA, basically Peru and Chile. How do you see the competitive dynamics there and, you know, how do you think that, you know, the EBITDA will evolve going forward?
Well, in Chile, we're not doing well. I think the country has been very competitive and difficult. Also, we lose a little bit of revenue because we used to have an MVNO one and they put the network and then they are not buying from us. So we lose a little bit of revenue over there. But we're working, we're reducing costs and gaining. I think we have a good month, a good quarter on the wireless. We're gonna see what does the competition and the market do. But I think we're starting to gain again market share in the wireless side. Well, we need to improve more on the commercial side.
And, and-
I will now.
Sorry. On Peru, what's our outlook on Peru? That, you know,
In Peru, if you see Peru, everything is on acquisition and a little bit on subsidies on equipment. If you take out that, we're growing, our revenues are growing well, and we have to take advantage of that market. We think that there's growth in the market, we're gonna go there and we're gonna try to take that growth there. Review carefully and see that all. If you compare this year against last year, this year we have more acquisition cost. The only thing that increases in cost and expenses is the acquisition cost, and a little bit of subsidies in postpaid and that's all. The rest, I think we're doing very well in Peru.
Growing also in the fixed side. Peru, in my view, is doing well and that's where we want to go. Now grow the company and grow the revenues.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Now I turn the call to Mr. Daniel Hajj for final remarks.
I'll just say thanks to all of you for being on the call, and thanks to Carlos García Moreno and Daniela Lecuona. Thank you very much.
Thank you all. Have a good day.
This concludes today's conference call. You may now disconnect.