France Telecom has insisted it can hit its cash flow target for 2009 by cutting capital spending after earnings at France’s leading telecoms company fell short of analysts’ expectations.

Following last week’s profit warning by Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom reported €4.3bn ($5.7bn) of earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for the first quarter of 2009, down 7.1 per cent compared with the same period last year.