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Informist, Friday, Mar. 28, 2025

MUMBAI – Shares of telecommunication companies are expected to move in a thin range next week due to lack of major triggers. Some stocks may move due to specific news, but the major trigger for the industry will be the upcoming March quarter earnings, research analysts said.

Bharti Airtel looks like a standout in the sector, and the stock might have a breakout in the near term, Anshul Jain, head of research at Lakshmishree Investment and Securities, said. As long as the stock sustains around the INR 1,735-1,740 levels, it might rise above INR 1,800 in the near-term, Jain said. Bharti Airtel ended 0.5% higher at INR 1,733.40 Friday.

Jain is bullish on the stock as it is the industry leader in terms of subscribers and has the highest average revenue per user in the sector, a metric that is key to driving growth for telecom companies. On the other hand, Jain calls Vodafone Idea "a dead man walking" as the operator keeps bleeding subscribers every quarter.

Meanwhile, in a research report, global brokerage Jefferies delved into why the entry of Elon Musk-backed Starlink into the Indian market may not have an adverse impact on domestic telecom companies. Starlink is unlikely to disrupt the local telecom market due to "capacity constraints", which will lead to premium pricing, NDTV Profit reported, citing Jefferies. Starlink has priced its services at 2-3 times the rate charged by domestic companies in both high-income markets such as the US and low-income markets such as Kenya and Nigeria, the report said. Another reason why Starlink is unlikely to be disruptive is due to its reliance on domestic telecom companies for distribution and installation.

"India is a price-sensitive market...any premium charged by the service (Starlink) will hurt their prospects," a research analyst at a domestic brokerage said. Jefferies also pointed out that the home broadband segment, which is the key target market for Starlink, forms just 8-9% of Reliance Jio's revenues and 4% of Bharti Airtel's India revenues, excluding towers.

Meanwhile, Union Telecom Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia said that alongside Starlink, other satellite communication services are also in the fray to begin their services. "We have already given out two licences, one to Reliance and the other to Bharti Airtel. For satellites, we have a number of companies that are in the pipeline that have applied," Moneycontrol reported Scindia as saying.

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* Bharti Airtel prepays 2024 auction liabilities, arm redeems $1-bln debt
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* Railtel Corp gets INR 252-mln order to renew label switching services
* Delhi HC grants bail to former Unitech director Ramesh Chandra in PMLA case

Following are the resistance and support levels for the stocks for next week as per calculations by Informist based on their prices on the National Stock Exchange:

End

Reported by Akash Mandal

Edited by Ashish Shirke

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