Nokia Corporation (NOK) Q3 Net Loss Widened To 969M Euros

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Struggling Finnish mobile phone maker Nokia Corporation (NYSE:NOK) (BIT:NOK1V) reported the third quarter net loss of €969 million ($1.27 billion) compared to €68 million quarterly loss in the same period a year ago. It was the sixth consecutive quarterly loss for the company. However, the net loss in the third quarter has declined from €1.4 billion loss posted in the previous quarter. Wall Street analysts were expecting a loss of €695 million.

Nokia Corporation (NOK) Q3 Net Loss Widened To 969M Euros

Nokia’s cash reserves have also depleted from €4.20 billion in June to €3.6 billion at the September end. However, Nokia chief executive Stephen Elop said he is quite satisfied with the company’s basic mobile phone unit and the wireless network business Nokia Siemens Network that earned €182 million in profits this quarter compared to €114 million loss in the same quarter last year.

Net sales for the three months came down to €7.2 billion from €8.98 billion in the same period a year ago. It was higher than the analysts’ estimate of €6.93 billion. Revenues have declined almost 50 percent since the fourth quarter of 2010 when the company CEO changed the company’s direction by tying up with Windows Phone in an attempt to compete with Apple and Samsung. But his strategies failed miserably. Since then, Nokia Corporation (NYSE:NOK) (BIT:NOK1V) has laid off more than 20,000 employees, shut down the research and production sites.

Now Nokia Corporation (NYSE:NOK) (BIT:NOK1V) is heavily relying on the the upcoming Lumia smartphones that will start shipping next month. During the third quarter, Nokia sold 6.3 million units of smartphones, down from 16.8 million units in Q3 last year. The company said 2.9 million units of them were Lumia devices running on Windows Phone. It sold 76.6 million basic phones this quarter. Analysts had expected 6.84 million unit sales of smartphones and 74.6 million units of basic phones.

The company said it is expecting another tough quarter due to ramp-up plans for the new Lumia devices and product transitions. There is some good news, too. “In our mobile phones business, the positive consumer response to our new Asha full-touch smartphones translated into strong sales,” Mr. Elop said.

Nokia Corporation (NYSE:NOK) (BIT:NOK1V) stocks jumped 3.6 percent 2.28 euros in Helsinki trading after the company said the losses from basic phone business has narrowed down. Nokia shares have declined 42 percent since the beginning of this year.

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