What Drove Sprint’s Fiscal 1Q17 Earnings Growth

Sprint’s (S) strong fiscal 1Q17 (ended June 2017) results indicate that a turnaround is on track. Sprint has begun to recover from years of customer losses and continues to make progress on customer retention, acquisition, and expense optimization initiatives.

In fiscal 1Q17, Sprint’s earnings grew significantly YoY (year-over-year). Its EPS (earnings per share) improved to $0.05 from -$0.08 in fiscal 1Q16, its first positive net income in three years.

Sprint reported solid fiscal 1Q17 results, suggesting that it is holding its own in an intensely competitive environment. Sprint reported strong financials, which were led in part by the company’s continued cost reduction initiatives. Over the past nine quarters, Sprint has slashed spending by around $4.0 billion.

According to a FierceWireless report on August 1, 2017, CEO Marcelo Claure stated that “this represents the progress of a turnaround journey that has delivered improvements in postpaid phone and prepaid customer growth, a return to top-line growth and a significantly transformed cost structure.”

In calendar 2Q17, Verizon’s (VZ) adjusted EPS improved by ~2.1% YoY to reach $0.96, excluding one-time items. Meanwhile, AT&T’s (T) EPS rose ~9.7% YoY to reach $0.79, and T-Mobile’s (TMUS) EPS rose ~168.0% YoY to reach $0.67. In the next part, we’ll look at Sprint’s revenue growth in fiscal 1Q17.