Todito Ebitda grows meagre 3% in Q3

Mexican ISP and e-commerce portal Todito reported third quarter Ebitda of 13.8mn pesos (US$1.24mn), 2.9% higher than the same period last year, the company said Thursday. "Our Ebitda growth was much lower than we would have liked due to increased hiring and expenses related to two new pre-paid services - long distance telephone service and dial-up internet connection in the United States," Todito finance director Ruben Jordan said in a statement. Todito Card was officially launch in late October in the US through 6,000 points of sale in Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Reno. Todito plans to expand distribution to 11,000 points of sale in other major Hispanic cities in the US by December 2003. "We expect cash flow generated from these new businesses will grow our Ebitda during 2004," he added Sales grew 33% to 45mn pesos, from 33.8mn pesos in 3Q02. Operating costs and expenses jumped 53% to 31.2mn pesos during the quarter, primarily due to increased advertising sales commissions and ISP sales costs as well as a 41% increase in wages due to about 30 new hires. Active users of the Todito Card dial-up Internet connection service grew 133% to 280,000 in the quarter up from 120,000 in 3Q02. Todito's audience increased 116% during the same period to an average of 1,000,000 unique visitors a day. Todito is jointly owned by Grupo Dataflux and TV Azteca (NYSE: TZA).