Hellenic Telecommuns Org

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I am Gail, your course call operator. Welcome and thank you for joining the OTEC conference call and live webcast to present and discuss the second quarter 2023 financial results. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Michael Tomas, Chairman and CEO, Mr. Babis Mazarakis, Chief Financial Officer, and Mr. Evrico Charcedis, Head of IR and M&A. Mr. Tomas, you may proceed.

Good morning or good afternoon to all of you. This morning we reported a solid second quarter in line with our expectations, confirming our steady growth as we adapt successfully to the new competitive challenges in the Greek market. Greek service revenues, including retail fixed, data communications and mobile, were roughly unchanged in the quarter, an improvement compared to the past two quarters. This reflects continuing growth in mobile, from both postpaid and prepaid, and improving trends in fixed. This resilience is commendable in a situation where total market revenue per user has dropped. We're aware of our customers' needs towards their wallets and we'll continue to offer them the best value proposition. But we have built our reputation on the quality of our technology and our services. That is something that is confirmed in survey after survey and something we will not compromise. We're pleased to observe quarter after quarter The vast majority of our customers feel the same way. We will continue to work hard in this direction. Improving trends in broadband drive the stabilization of retail fixed services. Our broadband market share remains constant. The deployment of our fiber-to-the-home infrastructure is proceeding apace. We already reach more than every fifth line in Greece, and we have installed more than 80% of the country's total fiber-to-home lines, more than 80% of the country's total fiber-to-home lines. This is important to secure both our wholesale and retail market shares. Fiber-to-home penetration is also on the rise, and we are continuing to upgrade customers to higher broadband speeds. As a result, we account for more than 70% of all fiber-to-home subscribers in Greece. As you know, being first in capturing the 500 home subscriber is critical. In addition to the resilient retail services, strong performances in other revenue streams and notably in ICD services to businesses and public administration resulted in higher total revenues in Greece up to more than 2%. Greek EBITDA was also up by nearly 1%. A less favorable revenue mix is the main reason of a slower growth than in the top line. And some of that growth is attributable to lower margin business-to-business services and to international wholesale, while some higher margin wholesale revenues are down. Regarding our cost base, we had a sharp drop in payroll this quarter, part of which is permanent and part one-off. Overall, we are maintaining our strict cost discipline. We have also negotiated a large part of our energy supplies for next year. Obviously, at somewhat higher prices, it has the benefit of raising our visibility over future expenses. Looking ahead to the second half of the year, we should continue getting some tailwind from the positive economic situation in Greece. In this context, we expect similar trends to continue, thanks in particular to positive momentum in our mobile activities. Our advanced 5G networks and superior customer service should help us secure our share of the market. In fixed, we also expect current improving trends to endure as we pursue the rollout of 5G to the home network and promote its utilization. We have the right ingredients to encourage growth in broadband, and that should be further supported by government fiber subsidies, which we do not expect until the end of the year. ICT revenues should also remain substantial, reflecting strong demand from public and private sectors as Greece pursues its broad progress in digitalization. Though they carry lower margins, these projects are also appreciable from a strategic standpoint. The wholesale business is a more difficult forecast, but as other players build their fiber infrastructure in Greece, there is no doubt that part of our national wholesale revenue base will gradually decline. Finally, we are seeing further growth in the new businesses that carry the COSMOTE brand into neighboring territories. Our basic payment system is gaining traction, with total users now reaching 135,000. We run a tight ship and intend to continue doing so. We have been able to maintain a high level of profitability in an increasingly competitive environment by being vigilant and agile. and always adapting our cost base to future business conditions as we see them. For the remainder of the year, there are many moving parts, but we are prepared for all scenarios and we will continue investing in our systems and our brands for the future. So once again, we can confirm our full-year outlook. CAPEX stood a touch low, the first half mark. However, we expect to see a significant push, particularly in FTTH in the second half, which will bring the full year total at last year's level of €640 million. As of the test 2023 shareholder remuneration, we're also confirming, like we did last quarter, the numbers we indicated at the year-end results. And now I'll ask Babis to review our second quarter performance.

Thank you, Michael. Hello to all of you on our call. Second quarter group revenues were up 1%, reversing the trend of the first quarter. Revenues in Greece were up more than 2% as mobile, ICT and wholesale more than offset an erosion in parts of retail fixed services, which by the way was milder than in the prior three quarters. In Romania, at minus 11%, The drop in revenues was in line with Q1 and still reflects the discontinuation of the MVNO business following the sale of the fixed business in 2021, as well as mobile termination rate cuts and some promotional initiatives of previous quarters. Group-adjusted EBITDA after leases was down nearly 2%, reflecting the performance of Romania where, in addition to the factors I just mentioned, our mobile subsidiary incurred a sharp increase of energy costs. In Greece, EBITDA was up nearly 1%. So in Greece, as I pointed out, revenues were up across the board, apart from retail fixed services, which recorded the mildest drop of the past four quarters, at less than 4% or less than 3%, including data communications. This means that going forward, the comps will be possibly easier, already incorporating the impact of certain initiatives from last year. Once again, the bulk of the decrease comes from legacy voice. In TV, subscriber numbers were stable at close to 650,000 in a season when sports programming represents a lesser draw. Our resilient broadband revenues base is a testimony that our speed increases of last year have fully paid off. we added another 9,000 customers during the quarter, bringing penetration to the base to just short of 87%. Reflecting our focus on migrating customers from copper to fiber, we recorded 25,000 fiber additions in Q2, all from FTTH. In fact, FTTH additions numbered 28,000, resulting in a total FTTH subscriber base of 194,000. This is a year-on-year increase of more than 100,000, even though we are comparing with a period during which the market enjoyed the benefit of state subsidies to the final FTTH customer. Fiber to the home penetration at the end of the quarter reached 19% of home past, a sharp increase from the second quarter last year of 14%. As you see, we are holding our ground in a change in competitive landscape by leveraging our advanced infrastructure and top customer service offerings. Other fixed revenues were up nearly 18%. We had yet another excellent quarter in ICT with a solid pipeline which should continue supporting this business line ahead of us. A word now on wholesale revenues which were up in the quarter after a sharp fall in Q1. Most of this increase comes from low margin. international transit, while domestic wholesale declined as other players built their own fiber infrastructure. Greek mobile service revenues were up more than 2%, with both prepaid and postpaid contributing to the growth. Despite increased competitive pressures, all mobile trends are generally going to the right direction. Most importantly, we are preserving our customer base, particularly when it comes to postpaid. In prepaid, we've had good take-up for our summer offers. So, all in all, our more-for-more strategy combined with network superiority are working and continuing to attract customers and support profitable and sustainable growth. This is also evident in our positive data KPIs. Note that average monthly data usage exceeded 10 gigabytes per user this quarter, which is up 45%. Regarding our 5G network, we have exceeded 85% population coverage and should reach 90% by year-end, with Athens already close to 100% and other major metropolitan areas not far behind. Let's now turn to what we've done on the cost side in Greece. Total operating expenses, including depreciation and amortization and one-offs, excluding depreciation and amortization and one-offs, We are up nearly 4% in the quarter. Costs directly linked with the top line, including third-party fees, which are related to the jump in ICT revenues and interconnection costs, are mainly responsible for most of this increase, while we continue to exercise stringent cost control measures across the board. Personal expenses declined 10% this quarter. Part of this decline is baked in and is due to savings from our early retirement plans. And part of it is one-off due to the new labor agreement with the union which eliminated certain legacy benefits that had been provisioned in the past. On the energy side, we are working on securing higher visibility for part of our energy requirements in 2024, although inevitably at higher costs and already likely to affect the second half of the current year. And budget provisions were down again this quarter, as they were in Q1, reflecting a much improved collection record over the past several quarters. All told, first quarter adjusted EBITDA after leases in Greece were up almost 1% to €322 million, yielding a healthy margin at 40.9%. Turning now to Romania, where total revenues were down 11%, roughly in line with the drop in the first quarter of the year and for the same reasons. In addition to the cutthroat competitive environment, which demands more customer retention efforts, we are still dealing with the impacts of mobile termination rate cuts and the loss of the MVNO contract. The impact from the MVNO services should be almost nil from Q3 of this year and onwards. Total operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization and one-offs, were down more than 4% in the quarter, following the drop in revenues, notably due to lower interconnection and handset costs. The cost base was negatively affected by the increase in energy costs, up approximately 2 million euros, due to the removal of the price cap. As a result, Telecom Romania Mobile's adjusted BDA after leases was nearly 5 million euros in the quarter, down from close to 14 million in Q2 of last year. As far as the rest of the group P&L is concerned, it is mainly business-as-usual this quarter again. Easiness expense is down marginally, income taxes are slightly down, and net income is up nearly 5% as it was in the first quarter. Turning to cash flow, adjusted capex is down less than 1%, is back to a normative level this quarter after a sharp drop in Q1. As we intensify hybrid home deployment, and to meet our year-end targets. That's why we are confirming the full-year 640 million euro guidance for CAPEX. Frequency flow after lease was down 8% at 144 million euros, mainly on lower EBITDA in Romania. In the first six months, frequency flow is down just 2% at 370 million, and our full-year guidance remains unchanged at approximately 500 million euros. Neither are we changing our shareholder remuneration guidance of 425 million euros. The final dividend was paid out last month, and we are a third of the way in our 2023 share buyback program of 175 million euros. So, to conclude, the second quarter was robust and confirms the validity of our strategy in Greek fixed mobile in a reheated competitive landscape. In Romania, while we have to bear the adjustments from several largely external factors, we are steadily strengthening our subscriber base and driving some encouraging ARPU increases that should support a much improved outlook. On this note, Michael and myself and our colleagues around the table are ready to take your questions. Operator?

The first question is from the line of Draziots Stamatis with Europe Bank Equities. Please go ahead.

Yeah. Hello, Darren. Thank you for taking my questions. So a couple from my side, please. Firstly, I was just a bit surprised that in your press release... You are mentioning that you expect similar trends in the second half of the year. I'm just saying that because you also said that the comparative is easier in H2, given you were cycling quite substantial year-on-year EBITDA growth in the first half of the year, and especially for fixed-line cycles. you will be lapping 5% revenue declines registered in H2 last year. So just wondering what exactly does similar trends mean? How should we interpret this? And my second question relates to this public consultation regarding the prospect of indexation of tariffs. Just wondering how did this go? Have you discussed further the matter with government officials, especially as there has been a new finance minister taking over since July? Do you feel the government is positive to the idea of inflation indexed retail price hikes at some point in the next few quarters? So these are my questions. Thank you.

Okay, good. Yes, thank you for the questions, and let me take the first question, which is the trends in half two. I can say that we are quite consistent in our messages that, as we were also in Q1, in the release of Q1 results, that the direction of the various segments of our business is running as we were expecting, meaning that we know that there is a pressure on the fixed side, We know that we see that our commercial offerings and customer experience in mobile drives keeps driving the mobile, which is something that we all expect to continue in the second half, but obviously this has to do with the reaction in the market and the competitive pressure. It's indeed fixed. We expect to have more favorable comparables towards the end of the year, Q3 and Q4, mainly, because we will be comparing ourselves with quarters that had some of the first stages of the competitive challenges. On the other side, the main revenue drivers, we were very explicit, is the ICT. rate, which is obviously at a much lower margin than the other lines. And also we are, as we said, losing the national wholesale revenue naturally because of migration of lines to the own networks of the other operators as they develop their own network. So these trends we are expecting to continue in the coming next quarters. also under the assumption that the competitive environment will not get worse. Of course, if it gets better, it's good, but it will not get worse. So I think we are consistent with the trends in half two, and it also remains to be seen to be realized in the markets in the various segments. Also, for the cost-cutting, We are continuing along the rationalization, as we have discussed also, and it's evident in our numbers. There is elements of the expenses line that are increasing because of the top line increase, like ICT and handsets, and international traffic in the connection port. So these also are reflected there. That's why we confirm our cash flow generation for the year, because we see that the trajectory of all these trends more or less being fully in line with what we had also discussed in Q1.

Okay, furthermore, regarding to your question on the CPI within the contract period of the customer and the consultation that had been taking place in the past weeks, what we have to say on this is that Okay. The consultation was related to the fact that the Greek regulatory code, let's say, on whether a company should be allowed to enforce price increases based on inflation during the contract period or not, not in line with the European directive. So the aim was, the discussion was, you know, how to implement the European directive. In fact, we're quite different compared to all other EU countries for this. So, now, the government officials have stated that they're not in favor of changing or in complying with the European directive. They prefer to leave the status as it is. Now, what we can say on this is that we have to keep in mind that in recent years the inflation in Greece, as in other European countries, was quite high. Recently we have more than 90% inflation. And if we look at the basket of consumers, which... of consumed items which constitute the, let's say, the inflation index, we will see that the only service that did not have any increases in this basket over the year was the telecom services. In fact, contrary to all the items that are included in the basket, which were increased by approximately an average of 9 percent, as it is published by the Statistical Bureau of Greece, the telecom services were declining by 2.44%. So, in fact, we were the only industry that had a reduction in our prices instead of increasing our prices. Now, this is an effect which has influenced our industry. It has been absorbed in many ways by our offset by the initiatives that we have undertaken. The reality is that in the last three years, we had to face increases in all our cost lines because of the international inflation. Okay. As far as our company goes, you have seen our results. We managed to offset these increases by reducing our costs, by reducing our exposure, let's say, to various activities which we thought we could stop in order to be able to offset any increases that we have had in the inflation. Despite the fact that we had a high inflation period, we managed quite well to contain our cost base and defend our bottom line. So for the future, it's not something that caught us off guard. It's not something that we cannot live with. We will manage with the situation as it is under this status. In fact, keep in mind that If a company wants to manage its costs, probably it has to look into the various promotions that they offer, or discounts or whatever. So there are quite a few measures that a company can take in order to manage effects they may have from inflation.

That's very clear. And just to clarify, so the government effectively has totally ruled out indexation, so they've not just hit the pause button.

No, we don't have a total rule out, as you stated. It's just, you know, the question was or the consultation was whether There should be an adaptation to the European directive or not. So this is something which is not going to happen for the time as far as I'm concerned.

Got it.

Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Okay. The next question is from the line of Patrick Morris with Barclays. Please go ahead.

Hi, guys. Thank you for taking the question. So just a couple from my side, please. During the call, you made a few comments around wholesale loss, and I think the point you were trying to make was as others build the fiber infrastructure in their, presumably you're talking about Vodafone and Wind Hellas, that you'll see lower wholesale revenues. I just wondered if you could expand a bit on that in terms of how big is that wholesale revenue, expect to lose, how quickly you think you'll lose it, and what sort of magnitude or drivers should we think about in terms of the size of that? And just on this second question, you made the observation in your prepared remarks around the fiber penetration, and you talked about how the penetration rate has been going up significantly since last year. On the first earnings call, so first quarter call, you talked about how some of the more mature cohorts are around sort of 50% penetration now. Just curious to understand if that sort of shape of penetration is changing or if you're still seeing the same level of take-ups on the new cohorts as you drive fiber further for the base. Thank you very much.

Thank you for the questions. On the wholesale, the wholesale revenues are made of two distinct sources. the international traffic, which bears minimum margin because it's basically a trading business, and the national wholesale, which has a good margin because it's service offered in the local market. So the comment was that while international traffic, due to its nature being a trading one, represents some I would say peaks and valleys in terms of quarters. This quarter we had an increase on that one versus the equivalent quarter of last year. And for the wholesale, that's something that we have also reiterated in the previous quarters. There is, let's say, a natural decline of these revenues in the area of €2 million this quarter. which comes from the reduction of the amount of lines that we serve to the other operators, since some of them, they are migrating into their own network. It's not something that is new. It's been there, and it's something that also works in the economics. Regarding the fiber to the home, I think that what we reported, this 19% of... utilization we have reported in June is the overall, dividing just the customers, total customers divided by total home past. Obviously, since the expansion of the network runs much faster than the take-up of the service, because that's the massive rollout that we are doing, the utilization number is also bearing this impact. The 50% which still holds is for the areas where we passed the fiber to the home three years ago. And we continue to see this gradually being achieved as we progress in the time. And we also expect that, let's say, on a going case, on a going concern after we completed the network, the total utilization will certainly reach those levels, if not exceeding them, because it will be the main network that we'll have out in the market as the time goes by.

Thank you. Just as a quick follow-up, sorry. So you talked about a €2 million decline this quarter as other operators migrate to their own networks. How much is that sort of current pool of wholesale revenues that's applicable that way so we can understand maybe on a three- or five-year view what sort of decline we can see, please?

The total pool as we saw in the accounts is about €200 million. Okay, great. Thank you.

The next question is from the line of Memisoglos, Monmouth-Abrosia Capital. Please go ahead.

Hello, many thanks. Just a few ones on my side. First, following up on this, just to clarify, this is $2 million quarterly figure. I guess we should... assume for the foreseeable future. That's the first one. Then I see you have a relatively sharp increase on depreciation this quarter. I just wanted to check if that's the new figure to work with or if there's any one-offs that we should consider. And the final one on my side regarding the fiber coupons and the outlook for them and any color on timing. Thank you.

Thank you for the questions. Osman, this is something on the wholesale, yeah, that's the rate that we foresee because it's a kind of steady part on the wholesale. On the DNA, yes, there is an increase. This is due to the, it's a one-off because we consolidated some of our headquarters buildings into one, so we had to depreciate the remaining part of the one that ceased to be serviced. And regarding fiber coupon, this is something that has been worked, a consultation with the government, and we expect this to come live towards the end of the year, maybe beginning of 2024.

Okay, so it's not in your 23 numbers. I mean, the guidance you've shared doesn't really... I assume any benefits from this, right?

No, no, no. It will be mostly, even if it comes 2023, it will be towards the end of the year. So it's mainly a 24 game.

Got it. Thank you.

Thank you.

The next question is from the line of Verodiakonou, George, with Citigroup. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon, and thank you for taking my questions. The first one is on energy. Earlier, Babis, you mentioned the fact that you've now hedged beyond 2023, perhaps at slightly higher rates. Do you mind just giving us a summary of how much you've hedged in the coming years, and maybe if you can give us a bit of an idea of the financial impact that we should expect? My second question is on CARB-X. You mentioned the fact that the run rate should accelerate in the second half as you build more FTTH. I know it may be a bit early to talk about 2024, but we'll be interested to hear from you what other drivers that could take CapEx a bit higher or lower over the course of next year. And then final question I had was around pricing moves. You mentioned the more for more in the presentation, particularly mobile. If you can give us any idea in terms of the timing of when you are thinking of making some of these changes to our tariff plans. And if I could ask one other thing is around the voucher program for fixed broadband, whether there is any update on that at all. Thank you.

Thank you for the question, George. So let's start with the energy part. I think if I can also repeat a little bit what we said in the speech. We, for 2024, actually at the end of 2023, will be over with our two-year previous deal that we had, which was done basically at lower rates than the market because it was done earlier in 2021. So now we are in a deal for 2024 at a favorable rate, but admittedly higher than 23, because the differences in the energy prices has been evident. The effect on 2024 on the energy bill per se is going to be increased versus 23. However, the other savings that we are enjoying from the other lines, like the rest of the transformation, will cover this increase. So that's for the energy part. On the CAPEX, it's natural to have a more intense CAPEX spending in half, too, because all the works that are being done, they take some time before they are completed. the elements of half two will be higher versus the elements of half one. And this is something because we are, as we get the licensing of constructing the new areas, this also accelerates a little bit the timing of the additional home paths. Overall, this doesn't mean increasing capex, not at all. It means that shifting between the two halves of the year. And for 2024, we stay in line with what we have discussed in the previous periods, that 2023 and 2024 will be basically the two years with the biggest capex, because it's the two years that actually we aspire to have almost close to 800,000 compost in the two years combined. So therefore, we don't change any of our initial guidance here and direction. On the other pricing moves, I think they're not pricing moves. They are actually more for more, as you said. It's value-driven propositions to our customer base, which we are continuing and we are doing. So it's not something that will be done anew. It's something that is already done. And it's being... intensified with campaigns like pre- to post-migration and more for more, as we also expand our 5G network over the country. So this basically is what drives the results of the mobile business. Obviously, that's not an eternal game, but it has room to grow. as the rollout of the 5G network offers a new opportunity to increase the data usage, as we have seen, which, by the way, in Q2 reached a record high for Q2 at 10 gigabytes per customer per month, which is what actually we are leveraging on in order to gain a little bit of output. And if I got correctly, the last question was about the FTTH coupon, which, as we said, is something that is being under consultation. It's something that is the benefit of the society and the digitalization of the country. So we expect this to be enacted on time in order to be in place towards the end of the year or maybe beginning of 2024. That will be for fiber to the home to the customer. A coupon that will be subsidizing the price of fiber to the home for the final customer.

That could follow up with a clarification on the CABEX phasing. You mentioned that 23 and 24 should be the peak. Should we expect a similar number in 24 or do you see a risk because of inflationary pressures that maybe it needs to be a bit higher than 23?

No, we don't foresee a higher capex in 2024 versus 2023. When the time comes, because capex is not only for fiber to the home, it has other elements as 5G and TV capex. So all of this, we need some more time to see how they will be baked in 2024. But overall, we don't foresee any increase versus the previous discussion we had that 2024 would not be higher than 2023. But the exact case will be fine-tuned as we know the specific elements of the CAPEX during the year.

Thank you. Excellent.

Thank you.

We have a follow-up question from the line of Memisoglu Osman with Ambrosia Capital. Please go ahead.

Yes, thank you. Just following up on Romania, shall we assume this around 5 million EBITDA to be now the steady state? If you could elaborate on the EBITDA outlook in general and keep performance there, that would be helpful. Maybe some color on the latest competitive dynamics. I mean, it started aggressive at the beginning of the year, but curious to hear what you're seeing on the ground lately, if there are any changes to either side. Thanks.

Thank you for the question, Ousmane. So on the competitive front, I think the Romanian market has always been very competitive, sometimes crossing maybe the line of irrational, but... Sorry. Okay, so let me start with the Romania question first, which is for the EBITDA, and then we talk about the competitive environment in Greece. So, in Romania, our EBITDA in Q2 was better than Q1 a little bit, denoting two things. One is the continuous effort to... stabilize and increase actually the customer base in contract, which as it is evident in our numbers, it's increasing, despite the heavy promotions and heavy subsidization from the overall market, and also the continuous transformation of the cost side after what we have experienced following the breakup of the two companies, the old fixed and the mobile. So this is our aspiration that in the next couple of quarters we will see not only these 5 million euros, but maybe more, quarter by quarter, which will be the signature of what we are doing in the market, in the company, is producing some early signs, results of stabilization. On the competitive environment in Greece, it's the same. I mean, it continues to be very challenging with a lot of commercial offerings that are spreading around in mobile and fixed. Our approach there has not changed. So we approach the mobile part by offering to our customers superior value through our network and the coverage we have and the speed in our network. which, as we saw in the numbers, it's appreciated since not only we increase a little bit our customer base, especially the postpaid one, but also the mobile revenues. On the fixed line, we're fixed the last TV segment, where competitive press is even more attuned with more aggressive offerings. We are holding up our customer base. We are increasing the broadband base. Obviously, on the revenue side, because of the ARPU dilution in an effort to hold up the customer base, we are comparing ourselves with Q1 and Q2 of 2022 when the coupon, the Fiber to Home coupon subsidy that we talked before was in place. Therefore, it was a much favorable condition at that time. And as we said, as we move forward, we will expect to see that more positive comparables with in fixed because we would start comparing our search with quarters where some of these competitive pressures were evident.

Perfect. Thank you, Boris. Thank you.

The next question is from our webcast participant, Ratziborsky Pryot. He has three questions, and I quote, Why have other operating costs increased so considerably year-on-year in second quarter 23? What were the main drivers? This is the first question. The second question is why has adjusted EBITDA in Greece was flat year-on-year in second quarter 23 despite year-on-year increase in sales and all the cost optimization incentives? Why has adjusted EBITDA in Romania improved versus first quarter 23? And the third question by Mr. Radziborski. Do you expect telecom services prices to decrease again in 2023? Thank you.

Thank you for the question. So starting with the first one about the operating costs, I guess this is for Greece. I think the main part there is... the direct cost for the ICT programs, which, as we said, was the main driver of this quarter. And the equivalent cost is booked in the other operating expenses. That's the biggest part of it that explains this difference. The second question, why has Adjacity BDA increased flat in Q2? It was not flat. It was a 1% increase. Again, the composition of the sales where we had basically our better performance in mobile covered fully the drop in the fixed. So that was the good news. And then the remaining increase in sales, which was the ICT, the handsets, and the international traffic bear lower margin. And the optimization incentives are evident in the cost lines, and they are helping delivering not only the growth we see in Q2, because of the seasonality between the two quarters, but also on the six months. And the EBITDA in this quarter, in Q2 versus Q1, again, I think we described before, it's a combination quarter by quarter of the improvement on the ARPU revenues, on the service revenues, following the stabilization and a little bit decrease of the postpaid business, and also the continuous driving of transformation. The third question was, do you expect telecom services price to decrease again 2023? I think this question might be related to Romania or to Greece. If it is to Greece, this has to do with the competitive environment. So it's not a decrease in prices, but it's a kind of overall offerings in the market, which continue in 2023, and we expect to prevail also for the second half. And if the question was for Romania, for the telecom prices, there are also the offerings are continuously reflecting the pressure in the ARPU. So there's no further decrease, but it's just continuation of the same competitive environment. Thank you. Yeah.

The next question is from the line of Dusan Petsas with WEBS. How many are the active PASI users and what is their average spending? What are the next plans for PASI this year? Thank you.

The current PASI users are in the area of 135,000 active users, which is reflecting the take-up of the service month by month. Now, regarding the plans, obviously, we are working on new features to be launched, and please bear with us in the coming quarters. You will see some more news for the new services that will be launched.

Thank you. And the last question from our webcast participants, from Anne Morris with Telco Titans. Are you still exploring strategic options for Telecom Romania mobile communications? Do you intend to retain this business long term? Thank you.

On this point, I will be consistent with our messages also from the last quarter. We are doing two things in Romania. The main thing is to stabilize the business because even if we want to pursue strategic activities, we need to have a performing asset, which is what we are trying to do. While at the same time, we are open and we are exploring indeed any strategic option that comes by, but this doesn't mean that we put on hold the competitive activities in our company in order to win in the market.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, there are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the conference over to management for any closing comments. Thank you.

Thank you all for your attention, questions, and interest. We're pleased with our performances in the second quarter and first half and confident in our prospects for the rest of the year. We will work hard to deliver our commitments. On this note, I wish you a nice summer. I look forward to our third quarter conference call at the beginning of November. Thank you everyone again and have a nice day.