Bharti Airtel's Shares Fall for Second Consecutive Day

Mumbai: The shares of leading telecom service provider Bharti Airtel fell for the second day following disappointing quarterly results. At the Bombay Stock Exchange the shares of the firm closed 6.40 percent down at 256.85 on August 9. It had closed 6.60 percent down at 274.40 on August 8. The company has also been pushed out of the list of top ten companies by market capitalisation. The firm had posted a 37 percent decline in net profit at 762 crore for the quarter ended June 30 against 1,215 crore during the like period of the previous financial year. Airtel said mobile revenues in India were impacted due two significant changes - the sector regulator Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, TRAI's guidelines around processing fees which restricted the sales of "combo packs" and the service tax hike from 10.3 percent to 12.36 percent. The hike effective April 1, 2012, caused all telecom services to become dearer by nearly 2 percent with the entire additional levy being passed through to the exchequer, it said.