Vodafone director spends £400,000

Simon Murray, a director at mobile phone giant Vodafone, has more than tripled his stake in the firm with the purchase of £400,000 of shares.

He bought 335,000 shares at just under 120p each and now has 492,500.

Last week Vodafone said revenue rose 9.3% in the quarter to June, helped by positive exchange rates and M&A activity, though organic service revenue fell due to weakness in Europe.

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The group also said it is trading in line with management's outlook issued in May 2009 for the current financial year.

Revenue rose from £9,828m to £10,743m in the quarter to June. But organic service revenue declined 2.1% due to weakness across most of Europe and Central Europe.

"In the first quarter the service revenue trend in Europe was consistent with the previous quarter and we continued to see good growth in India and South Africa," said chief executive Vittorio Colao.

The shares have withstood the economic downturn relatively well, falling about 10%.

Murray has been a non-executive director with Vodafone since 1 July 2007.

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