The Telstra CEO says he expected a fall in their full-year profits which were down by 40 per cent to $2.15 billion.

Its last year’s profit was 3.5 billion but this year’s result can be attributed to the $600 million hit to earnings since the introduction of NBN.

The company has so far cut costs by $1.2 billion as it focuses on reducing the size of the company with would see 8,000 jobs cut by 2023.

But they did pick up 378,000 new mobile customers and reduced their fixed cost base by 6 per cent.

Telstra CEO Andy Penn tells Ross Greenwood they had expected the low-profit result.

“We are systematically transferring a major part of our business, which is the wholesale broadband services to the NBN, so that clearly has an impact.”

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Image: Getty/ William West