Shares of Bharti Airtel rose over 2 per cent on the National Stock Exchange Thursday morning, recovering from a 52-week low hit earlier in the session, as investors digested a broadly in-line quarterly earnings report alongside a notable share swap deal involving its Africa unit.
The stock touched an intraday low of ₹1,740.50 — its weakest in a year — before recovering to trade at ₹1,829.60, up ₹40.40 or 2.26 per cent, as of 10:02 AM IST. The stock opened at ₹1,820 and hit a high of ₹1,832.30. Traded volume stood at 48.43 lakh shares, with a traded value of ₹877.63 crore. The stock’s year-to-date decline stands at 13.60 per cent, underperforming the Nifty 50’s 10.25 per cent fall over the same period. Its 52-week high was ₹2,174.50, hit in November 2025.
The results themselves, reported on Wednesday, drew mixed but largely constructive reactions from the Street. Morgan Stanley (Overweight, TP ₹2,450) noted consolidated revenues were in line with its estimates and beat consensus by 1.4 per cent, while EBITDA beat both. JPMorgan (Overweight, TP ₹2,300) called India wireless and Homes numbers broadly in line, flagging that mobile ARPU dipped 0.8 per cent sequentially to ₹257 due to seasonality and the impact of the Middle East conflict on international roaming. India capex (excluding towers) surged 59 per cent quarter-on-quarter to ₹113 billion, sharply ahead of JPMorgan’s estimate of ₹80 billion. CLSA raised its target to ₹2,310 and highlighted Africa as the positive surprise driver. Jefferies raised its target to ₹2,350 from ₹2,250, lifting FY27-28 estimates by 5 per cent. UBS was the outlier with a Sell rating and ₹2,030 target, citing soft Indian mobile ARPUs and rising capex intensity.
The other major development was Airtel’s board-approved share swap with promoter entity ICIL, under which the company will issue up to 146.8 million new shares at ₹1,923 apiece to acquire ICIL’s 16.31 per cent stake in listed Airtel Africa — roughly 2.4 per cent equity dilution. Most brokerages viewed the cashless transaction as earnings accretive and structurally positive for minority shareholders, though UBS flagged increased Africa exposure as a concern.
The board also declared a dividend of ₹24 per share for FY26, up 50 per cent year-on-year and ahead of consensus expectations.
Published on May 14, 2026