Which telco gained the most subscribers in 1Q12?

SingTel beat its two rivals in mobile subscriber acquisitions for the first quarter of the year.

This helped SingTel grow its profits 4%, but margin pressures are mounting as postpaid bundling discounts become ever more prevalent and eat up more of its bottomline.

Here's more from PhillipCapital:

SingTel Singapore dominated subscriber acquisitions in the quarter, outperforming its local peers that had relatively stagnant mobile subscriber base.

Despite relatively weak performance from its local peers, SingTel Singapore’s mobile subscriber acquisitions were strong. However, a significant decline in postpaid ARPU to S$82/mth reflected bundling discounts offered to customers. This appears to be an effort by the company to engage customers on multiple platforms, in our view. SingTel gained 21k fibre customers in the quarter, as compared to 7k for M1 (undisclosed for Starhub). SingTel booked exceptional tax credit of S$270mn due to the increase in value of assets transferred to an associate.

Optus will be undergoing a restructuring to streamline its business and 750 jobs would be made redundant. Postpaid mobile subscriber continued to increase by 82k q-q, but blended ARPU came under pressure to A$43/mth.

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