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Jan 26 (Reuters) - Swedish telecom operator Tele2 TEL2b.ST on Thursday reported fourth quarter core profits above market forecasts but said it expected to make a bigger cut than expected of its dividend for 2017.
* Tele2 net sales for Q4 amounted to SEK 8,217 mln vs year-ago 6,943 mln
* Q4 EBITDA amounted to SEK 1,459 mln vs year-ago 1,337 mln
* Reuters poll: Q4 EBITDA was seen at SEK 1,259 mln, sales at 7,823 mln Says board of directors recommends a dividend for 2016 of SEK 5.23 per share and expect to propose a dividend for 2017 of SEK 4.00 per share
* Reuters poll: mean forecast 2016 dividend 5.24 SEK/share, 2017 dividend seen at 4.68 SEK/share
* Tele2 sees 2017 net sales of between SEK 31 and 32 billion
* Reuters poll: mean forecast 2017 net sales SEK 32.2 bln
* Tele2 sees 2017 EBITDA between SEK 5.9 and 6.2 billion
* Tele2 sees 2017 capex of 3.8 to 4.1 billion SEK
* "2017 will see continued disciplined investment in both our Dutch mobile business and in the ramp-up of the integration of TDC Sweden," Tele2 CEO Allison Kirkby said in a statement
* Says expects by 2019 the dividend to be fully covered by the equity free cash flow generation of the group while authorization to pay extraordinary dividends will be sought when the company has excess capital
* Tele2's previous policy was for dividend to show annual growth of 10 percent during 2015-2017
* Says financial leverage view implies a target economic net debt to EBITDA ratio of 2.0-2.5x (earlier 1.5-2.0x) over the medium term.
Source text for Eikon: ID:nWkray5973 Further company coverage: TEL2b.ST