Crown Castle Inc (CCI) 2024 Q4 法說會逐字稿

Good afternoon and welcome to the fourth quarter 2024 Crown Castle earnings conference call. All participants will be in a listen-only mode. (Operator Instructions)

下午好，歡迎參加 Crown Castle 2024 年第四季財報電話會議。所有參與者將處於只聽模式。（操作員指示）

Please note this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Kris Hinson, Vice President of Corporate Finance and Treasurer. Please go ahead.

請注意，此事件正在被記錄。現在，我想將會議交給公司財務副總裁兼財務主管克里斯辛森 (Kris Hinson)。請繼續。

Thank you, Marcy and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us today as we discuss our fourth quarter 2024 results. With me on the call this afternoon are Steven Moskowitz, Crown Castle's Chief Executive Officer, and Dan Schlanger, Crown Castle's Chief Financial Officer. To aid the discussion, we have posted supplemental materials in the Investor Section of our website at crowncastle.com that will be referenced throughout the call.

謝謝你，Marcy，大家下午好。感謝您今天加入我們，一起討論 2024 年第四季的業績。今天下午與我一起參加電話會議的還有 Crown Castle 執行長 Steven Moskowitz 和 Crown Castle 財務長 Dan Schlanger。為了幫助討論，我們在我們的網站 crowncastle.com 的投資者部分發布了補充資料，將在整個電話會議中參考。

This conference call will contain forward-looking statements which are subject to certain risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, and actual results may vary materially from those expected.

本次電話會議將包含前瞻性陳述，這些陳述受某些風險、不確定性和假設的影響，實際結果可能與預期結果有重大差異。

Information about potential factors which could affect our results is available in the press release and the risk factor sections of the company's SEC filings. Our statements are made as of today, March 13, 2025, and we assume no obligation to update any forward-looking statements.

有關可能影響我們業績的潛在因素的資訊可在新聞稿和公司向美國證券交易委員會提交的文件的風險因素部分中找到。我們的聲明截至今天（2025 年 3 月 13 日）做出，我們不承擔更新任何前瞻性聲明的義務。

In addition, today's call includes discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. Tables reconciling these non-GAAP financial measures are available in the supplemental information package in the investor section of the company's website at crowncastle.com. With that, let me turn the call over to Steven.

此外，今天的電話會議還討論了某些非公認會計準則財務指標。調整這些非 GAAP 財務指標的表格可在公司網站 crowncastle.com 的投資者部分的補充資訊包中找到。說完這些，讓我把電話轉給史蒂文。

Thank you, Chris, and good afternoon, everyone. Today our company announced very exciting news, that we successfully signed a definitive agreement to sell a fiber segment to a combination of companies EQT Active Core Infrastructure Fund, and ZAO Group Holdings. EQT has agreed to acquire Crown Castle's small cell business, and ZAO has agreed to acquire Crown Castle's commercial enterprise fiber business.

謝謝你，克里斯，大家下午好。今天，我們公司宣布了一個非常令人興奮的消息，我們成功簽署了一項最終協議，將光纖部門出售給 EQT Active Core Infrastructure Fund 和 ZAO Group Holdings 兩家公司的合併公司。EQT已同意收購Crown Castle的小型基地台業務，而ZAO已同意收購Crown Castle的商業企業光纖業務。

The transaction will be subject to customary regulatory approvals, and we expect the transaction to close sometime in the first half of 2026. I'm happy to say that with this announced transaction, we have officially concluded Crown Castle's cyber strategic review. Let me repeat, we have officially concluded Crown Castle's fiber strategic review.

該交易將獲得常規監管部門的批准，我們預計交易將於 2026 年上半年完成。我很高興地說，隨著此次交易的宣布，我們正式完成了 Crown Castle 的網路策略審查。讓我再說一遍，我們已經正式完成了 Crown Castle 的光纖策略審查。

As we've conveyed in the past, the board of directors dedicated a tremendous amount of time to conduct a comprehensive, strategic and operational review of the fiber businesses, with the endgame in mind to maximize shareholder value.

正如我們過去所表達的那樣，董事會投入了大量時間對纖維業務進行全面、策略和營運審查，最終目的是實現股東價值最大化。

After considering a variety of transaction structures and potential counterparties, we believe the sale of these businesses to EQT and ZAO will maximize the long-term value to Crown Castle's shareholders from the combination of the proceeds from this transaction and Crown Castle's ability to enhance the value of our tower business by creating a focused and premium pure play US tower company.

在考慮了各種交易結構和潛在交易對手後，我們認為，將這些業務出售給 EQT 和 ZAO 將最大化 Crown Castle 股東的長期價值，因為此次交易的收益與 Crown Castle 通過創建一家專注、優質的純美國鐵塔公司來提升我們鐵塔業務的價值的能力相結合。

In consultation with financial, legal, and strategic advisors, and the executive management team of Crown Castle, Crown Castle made the decision to sell the businesses at this time for the following reasons. Although the 90,000 route miles of high strand count fiber located in the largest markets in the US are great assets, the fiber solutions business has a different business model, and different customer base than towers and requires different operational capabilities.

在與財務、法律和策略顧問以及 Crown Castle 的執行管理團隊協商後，Crown Castle 決定此時出售業務，原因如下。儘管位於美國最大市場的 90,000 英里高股數光纖路線是一筆巨大的資產，但光纖解決方案業務具有與塔不同的商業模式和不同的客戶群，並且需要不同的營運能力。

Because the similarities between towers and fiber solutions are somewhat limited, we determined they should be separated to enhance focus on the systems, structure, and capabilities needed to maximize the value of towers.

由於塔和光纖解決方案之間的相似性有限，我們決定將它們分開，以加強對最大化塔價值所需的系統、結構和功能的關注。

And while towers and small cells share similar market dynamics, we ultimately decided that the operating capabilities needed to run a tower business and a small cell business were dissimilar enough that the synergies between the two businesses were more than offset by the enhanced value we believe we will unlock in the tower business by creating a focused and premium pure play US tower company.

儘管塔和小型基地台具有相似的市場動態，但我們最終認為，營運塔業務和小型基地台業務所需的營運能力有足夠的差異，以至於兩項業務之間的協同效應被我們相信將透過創建一家專注、優質的純美國塔公司在塔業務中釋放的增值所抵消。

Lastly, we felt that if we were able to secure enough value for the fiber portfolio, it would position the tower business well for future growth and maximize shareholder value. After the anticipated transaction closes, we will generate substantial cash proceeds from the sale of our fiber segment that we expect to use to transform our tower business by repaying debt, strengthening our balance sheet, and returning capital to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases.

最後，我們認為，如果我們能夠為光纖組合確保足夠的價值，那麼它將為塔業務的未來成長奠定良好的基礎，並實現股東價值最大化。預期交易完成後，我們將透過出售光纖部門獲得大量現金收益，我們預計將利用這些收益來償還債務、加強資產負債表以及透過股利和股票回購向股東返還資本，從而轉變我們的塔業務。

We believe this greater financial flexibility and optionality will help us to grow into the future as the only pure public US tower company, which I'll comment a little bit later in the discussion. Additionally, we believe in the attractive value of our US tower business and that share repurchases are a compelling opportunity in the current market environment.

我們相信，這種更大的財務靈活性和選擇性將幫助我們成長為未來唯一一家純粹的美國上市塔公司，我將在稍後的討論中對此發表評論。此外，我們相信我們的美國塔業務具有吸引人的價值，並且股票回購在當前市場環境下是一個極具吸引力的機會。

So before I move on, I would like to send a message of thanks and appreciation to the Crown Castle employees, particularly those on the fiber side and those who have been providing extensive corporate support to the fiber businesses. Your tireless work has allowed us to continue delivering solid results as we've evaluated strategic alternatives.

因此，在繼續之前，我想向 Crown Castle 的員工，特別是光纖方面的員工以及那些為光纖業務提供廣泛公司支持的員工，表示感謝和讚賞。當我們評估策略替代方案時，您的不懈努力使我們能夠繼續取得堅實的成果。

As part of the strategic and operating review, we announced a realignment of our operational strategy to focus on free cash flow generation as opposed to top line revenue growth. We increased the hurdle rates of our project pipeline, increased the efficiency of our capital spending, and updated our 2024 forward forecast. And through all of this, Our fiber solutions, our small cells, and our corporate support teams remain positive, intent on delivering for customers at the same rate as always, and focused on achieving solid financial and operating results. So thank you, thank you to the Crown Castle team members.

作為策略和營運審查的一部分，我們宣布重新調整營運策略，將重點放在自由現金流的產生上，而不是收入的成長。我們提高了專案儲備的最低收益率，提高了資本支出的效率，並更新了 2024 年的預測。透過這一切，我們的光纖解決方案、小型基地台和企業支援團隊依然保持積極態度，致力於以一如既往的速度為客戶提供服務，並專注於實現穩健的財務和營運績效。所以，謝謝你們，感謝皇冠城堡團隊的成員。

I also want to send a shout out to our lead advisors, Marco and Calvin at Morgan Stanley, Dan and Chris at Bank of America, Andrew and Scott at Paul Weiss, Dave and Harry at Morgan Lewis, and Sarah at Ernst and Young. We appreciate you and your team's dedication to helping us complete this transaction.

我還要向我們的首席顧問致謝，他們是摩根士丹利的 Marco 和 Calvin、美國銀行的 Dan 和 Chris、寶維斯的 Andrew 和 Scott、摩根路易斯的 Dave 和 Harry 以及安永的 Sarah。我們感謝您和您的團隊為幫助我們完成此次交易所所做的貢獻。

Now let me focus for a few minutes on our results for last year. I'm pleased to report that our teams delivered solid operating and financial performance for the fourth quarter and full year 2024 across our towers, fiber solutions, and small cell businesses.

現在，請容許我花幾分鐘來回顧我們去年的表現。我很高興地報告，我們的團隊在第四季度和 2024 年全年的塔台、光纖解決方案和小型基地台業務方面取得了穩健的營運和財務業績。

Our results continue to validate our ability to deliver for our customers and shareholders in a year where we implemented significant changes to how we operate and invest in our business. In fact, we drove structural reductions in operating costs of $100 million on an annualized basis and reduce net CapEx by almost $200 million versus the revised 2024 full year forecast that we announced in June and $400 million versus the original 2024 guidance we provided in October of 2023.

在我們對業務運營和投資方式實施重大變革的一年裡，我們的業績繼續證明了我們為客戶和股東提供服務的能力。事實上，我們推動了年度營運成本結構性削減 1 億美元，並將淨資本支出與我們 6 月宣布的 2024 年全年修訂預測相比減少了近 2 億美元，與我們 2023 年 10 月提供的 2024 年原始指引相比減少了 4 億美元。

We achieved these cost reductions while delivering organic growth net of Sprint churn of 4.5% in towers, 12% in small cells, and 2% in fiber solutions. There is a point I want to emphasize, and that is the 12% organic growth in small cells was driven by over 12,500 revenue generating nodes that we added during 2024. And not only is that in line with the updated guidance we had gave in conjunction with our operating plan changes that we announced in June, it happens to be the highest level of incremental annual node production in the company's history.

我們實現了這些成本削減，同時實現了扣除 Sprint 客戶流失率後的有機增長，其中塔類客戶流失率下降了 4.5%，小型基地台客戶流失率下降了 12%，光纖解決方案客戶流失率下降了 2%。我想強調一點，小型基地台 12% 的有機成長是由我們在 2024 年增加的超過 12,500 個創收節點推動的。這不僅符合我們 6 月宣布的營運計畫變更中給出的最新指導，而且也是公​​司歷史上增量年度節點產量的最高水平。

There are a couple of additional items we noted in our press release that I would like to comment on briefly. First, we've enhanced the way we report our organic growth to provide investors with more specificity around recurring revenue, and these changes are reflected in the numbers that I just mentioned 4.5% growth in towers, 12% growth in small cells, and 2% growth in fiber solutions.

我們在新聞稿中還提到了另外幾點，我想簡單評論一下。首先，我們改進了報告有機增長的方式，以便為投資者提供有關經常性收入的更多具體信息，這些變化反映在我剛才提到的數字中：塔增長 4.5%，小型基站增長 12%，光纖解決方案增長 2%。

With this more granular approach to organic growth reporting, which you can find in our earnings supplement, we've separated out other billings and other revenues which capture the impact of items unrelated to recurring leasing activity, including non-recurring revenue items like back billings like pass through taxes and tenant cancellation fees.

透過這種更細緻的有機成長報告方法（您可以在我們的收益補充報告中找到），我們​​分離出了其他帳單和其他收入，這些收入反映了與經常性租賃活動無關的項目的影響，包括非經常性收入項目，如轉嫁稅和租戶取消費等後期帳單。

We believe providing this additional level of transparency is a better indication of recurring growth and will help investors better track our underlying business in progress. We will continue to look at ways to improve our disclosures and provide investors with more granularity and transparency, which we hope is helpful to understand the financial and operating performance of the business.

我們相信，提供這種額外的透明度可以更好地表明持續成長，並將幫助投資者更好地追蹤我們正在進行的基礎業務。我們將繼續尋找改善資訊揭露的方法，為投資者提供更詳細、更透明的信息，希望這有助於了解企業的財務和經營業績。

As is always the case in the fourth quarter, we performed our annual goodwill impairment test, which indicated that the carrying amount of the fiber reporting unit, which includes both our small cells and fiber solutions businesses, exceeded its estimated fair value.

與第四季度一樣，我們進行了年度商譽減損測試，結果表明，包括小型基地台和光纖解決方案業務在內的光纖報告單位的帳面價值超過了其估計的公允價值。

As a result, we've recorded a goodwill impairment charge of about $5 billion for full year 2024. And have no goodwill remaining for the fiber reporting segment. The reduction to fair value is driven primarily by our decision to reduce and defer our small cell development plans because of the changes we made in our return thresholds. Also the work that we did with our customers on their recalibrated network deployment plans in the short and midterm and the higher cost of capital we've experienced as interest rates have stayed higher for longer than anticipated.

因此，我們記錄了 2024 年全年約 50 億美元的商譽減損費用。且對於光纖報告部門而言沒有剩餘商譽。公允價值的降低主要是因為我們決定減少和延遲我們的小型基地台開發計劃，因為我們對回報門檻做出了改變。此外，我們還與客戶一起制定了短期和中期的重新調整網路部署計劃，並且由於利率維持在高位的時間比預期的要長，我們所經歷的資本成本也更高。

So for the outlook for 2025, I wanted to start the discussion off by mentioning that our 2025 outlook looks different. Since it excludes the results of our fiber segment, which on a go-forward basis for reporting purposes will be accounted for in discontinued operations. We will continue to operate the fiber segment as in the ordinary course of business during 2025 and believe it will generate results largely in line with 2024.

因此，對於 2025 年的展望，我想先提到，我們的 2025 年展望看起來有所不同。因為它不包括我們的光纖部門的業績，而出於報告目的，該部門的業績將在未來計入已停止的業務中。2025 年，我們將繼續按照正常業務流程營運光纖部門，並相信其業績將與 2024 年基本持平。

As a result of these changes in reporting, I will only be talking about tower outlook for 2025. So as it relates to towers, underlying our 2025 outlook, we believe we will deliver organic growth of 4.5% in towers, excluding the impact of Sprint consolidation churn.

由於報告中的這些變化，我將只談論 2025 年的塔展望。因此，就塔而言，根據我們對 2025 年的展望，我們相信，不包括 Sprint 整合流失的影響，塔的有機成長將達到 4.5%。

As we see our customers' activity levels being similar in 2025 to what we experienced in 2024. The wireless carrier's level of activity continues to be positive as they are busy fortifying their networks with new spectrum and new equipment. Most of the work on our sites continues to be 5G overlays.

我們發現，2025 年客戶的活動量與我們 2024 年所經歷的相似。該無線營運商的活動水平繼續保持積極，因為他們正忙於使用新頻譜和新設備來加強其網路。我們網站上的大部分工作仍然是 5G 覆蓋。

As our customers shift toward densification, we believe our towers are well positioned to capture this activity. As a result, for 2025, we believe it will be a continuation of solid growth with organic growth, excluding Sprint cancellations of 4.5%. Now, our growth in 2025 is offset by the impact of the Sprint consolidation churn, which the company has previously reported. This churn, which is hit as of January 1, will be approximately $205 million in towers.

隨著我們的客戶轉向密集化，我們相信我們的塔已準備好迎接這項活動。因此，我們相信，到 2025 年，它將繼續保持穩健成長和有機成長（不包括 Sprint 取消的 4.5%）。現在，我們 2025 年的成長被 Sprint 整合流失的影響所抵消，公司先前已經報告過這一點。此次流失是從 1 月 1 日起開始的，塔樓方面的損失約為 2.05 億美元。

Now staying with churn expectations for towers, we also expect to have just under 1% churn, excluding Sprint in 2025. And looking beyond this year, our expected churn range remains 1% to 2%. Now this includes around $20 million in annual Sprint churn that we have from leases that will be coming to their natural final termination date between 2026 and 2034.

現在，根據對塔台客戶流失率的預期，我們也預期 2025 年的客戶流失率將略低於 1％，不包括 Sprint。展望今年以後，我們預期客戶流失率仍將在 1% 至 2% 之間。現在，這包括我們每年從 Sprint 獲得的約 2000 萬美元的流失費用，這些費用來自將在 2026 年至 2034 年之間到達其自然最終終止日期的租約。

So our longer-term churn expectations excluding the trailing Sprint churn is between 0.5% to 1.5%. In towers for 2025, you can expect to see an increase in capital spending, and the majority of that anticipated increase is going to investing and controlling the parcels of land under our towers.

因此，除了 Sprint 的後續流失率之外，我們對長期流失率的預期在 0.5% 到 1.5% 之間。在 2025 年的塔中，您可以預期看到資本支出的增加，而預期增加的大部分將用於投資和控制我們塔下的地塊。

This higher expected level of investment will be focused on select site locations that we deem as both strategic. They may generate significant revenue or be prime sites for future co-location activity and also provide us positive returns. By either extending leases to perpetual easements or acquiring the deed, we'll use our capital wisely to secure future cash flows and improve operating margins.

預期的更高投資水準將集中在我們認為具有戰略意義的特定地點。它們可能會產生可觀的收入，或成為未來主機託管活動的主要場所，同時也為我們帶來正面的回報。透過將租約延長至永久地役權或獲得契約，我們將明智地利用我們的資本來確保未來的現金流並提高營業利潤率。

We also expect to spend more to improve our project management capabilities and to enable us to work more closely with our customers to make faster and more informed commercial and operating decisions. We believe these initiatives will make it more efficient for our customers to add equipment or co-locate on our sites, accelerate the customer application cycle time, and increase the rate by which customers can complete their installations.

我們也預計將投入更多資金來提高我們的專案管理能力，並使我們能夠與客戶更緊密地合作，做出更快、更明智的商業和營運決策。我們相信，這些措施將使我們的客戶能夠更有效率地在我們的網站上添加設備或進行共置，加快客戶的應用週期，並提高客戶完成安裝的速度。

So as we move to our priorities in towers for 2025, I'll refer to slide 5 in the earnings presentation. Basically, here's what you can expect from us. Customer service, we're going to be absolutely laser-focused on delivering great customer service for the wireless carriers as we drive operational excellence into the business, refining processes, leveraging technology better, and enhancing automation, all in the effort to improve speed and ease of service.

因此，當我們談到 2025 年塔台的優先事項時，我將參考收益報告中的第 5 張投影片。基本上，以下就是我們為您提供的服務。客戶服務，我們將全心全意地為無線營運商提供優質的客戶服務，推動卓越運營，改進流程，更好地利用技術，提高自動化程度，所有這些都是為了提高服務的速度和便利性。

I mentioned operational excellence. Operational excellence is critical for us. Again, we're going to look to leverage technology and make sure that we have what we need to be able to make very well informed commercial and operating decisions with our customers benefiting both of us.

我提到了卓越營運。卓越的營運對我們來說至關重要。再次，我們將尋求利用技術並確保我們擁有所需的一切，以便能夠與客戶一起做出非常明智的商業和營運決策，從而使我們雙方都受益。

Improved profitability is also critical, and we will leverage our scale and operational efficiency as we look to secure and optimize our long-term revenue and drive operating margins higher through efforts like those to economically secure the land under our towers, which I just mentioned before.

提高獲利能力也至關重要，我們將利用我們的規模和營運效率，尋求確保和優化我們的長期收入，並透過諸如我剛才提到的經濟上確保我們塔下土地的努力來提高營業利潤率。

And strong balance sheet. We will target investment grade credit rating and practice strong financial discipline while allocating capital to maximize shareholder returns. And while we will focus on these four strategic priorities, we'll be working very hard to deliver for the buyers of our fiber businesses and to pursue a transition and separation plan with the closing anticipated to be in the first half of 2026.

以及強勁的資產負債表。我們將以投資等級信用評級為目標，實行嚴格的財務紀律，同時分配資本以最大化股東回報。雖然我們將專注於這四個策略重點，但我們將竭盡全力為我們的光纖業務買家提供服務，並推行過渡和分離計劃，預計將在 2026 年上半年完成。

So while we're focused on these priorities as we work to close the sale of the fiber and small cell businesses, we know the next goal for our company is to maximize shareholder value as a focused pure play US tower company. And with the sale of the fiber segment, we're updating our capital allocation framework to focus more on free cash flow generation.

因此，當我們致力於完成光纖和小型基地台業務的銷售時，我們將重點關注這些優先事項，同時我們知道，作為一家專注於純粹的美國塔業務的公司，我們公司的下一個目標是實現股東價值最大化。隨著光纖部門的出售，我們正在更新資本配置框架，以更加重視自由現金流的產生。

In financial flexibility as you can see on slide 6, it starts first and foremost with returning capital to our shareholders via quarterly dividend. Going forward, Crown Castle intends to set its dividend at a rate of about 75% to 80% of AFFO excluding amortization of pre-paid rent. We anticipate reducing our annual dividend to approximately $4.25 per share starting in the second quarter of 2025 based on our expected annual AFFO excluding amortization of pre-paid rent following the close.

在財務靈活性方面，正如您在第 6 張投影片上看到的那樣，它首先是透過季度股息向股東返還資本。展望未來，Crown Castle 打算將其股息設定為 AFFO 的 75% 至 80% 左右（不包括預付租金的攤提）。根據我們預期的年度 AFFO（不包括收盤後的預付租金攤銷），我們預計從 2025 年第二季開始將年度股息減少至每股約 4.25 美元。

Second, after the close, we will target about $150 million to $250 million of annual organic capital expenditures, opportunistically pursuing value enhancing growth, and this includes purchasing land under our towers, which is a key priority for us this year and in the future, selective new builds as we have opportunities, and investing more in technology to enhance our margins or our revenue growth.

其次，交易完成後，我們將設定每年約 1.5 億至 2.5 億美元的有機資本支出目標，伺機追求增值增長，其中包括購買我們大樓下的土地，這是我們今年和未來的首要任務，有機會時選擇性新建大樓，並在技術方面投入更多資金，以提高我們的利潤率或收入增長。

The third thing we're going to do post closing is we plan to manage our debt balance to maintain an investment grade credit rating. After closing the fiber transaction, we expect to use substantial cash proceeds to repay debt. And based on preliminary analysis, we believe the enhanced ability of our free cash flow profile as a pure-play US tower business will allow us to maintain an investment grade credit rating with a target leverage between 6 times and 6.5 times.

交易完成後我們要做的第三件事是計劃管理我們的債務餘額，以維持投資等級信用評級。完成光纖交易後，我們預計將使用大量現金收益來償還債務。根據初步分析，我們相信，作為一家純粹的美國塔式業務公司，我們自由現金流狀況的增強將使我們能夠維持投資級信用評級，目標槓桿率在 6 倍至 6.5 倍之間。

Finally, we expect to repurchase shares. Currently, Crown Castle intends to implement the share repurchase program of approximately $3 billion in conjunction with the close of the transaction, which we expect to happen again in the first half of 2026.

最後，我們預計將回購股票。目前，Crown Castle 打算在交易完成時實施約 30 億美元的股票回購計劃，我們預計該計劃將在 2026 年上半年再次發生。

We believe this capital allocation framework provides an attractive near-term capital return while allowing financial flexibility to pursue opportunistic share repurchases, as well as organic growth and inorganic growth opportunities in the future.

我們相信，這種資本配置框架提供了有吸引力的短期資本回報，同時允許財務靈活性以追求機會性股票回購，以及未來的有機成長和無機成長機會。

I'd like to conclude by saying that as a pure-play US tower company with clear focus in driving best-in-class customer service and more efficient operations, we believe we will have a unique opportunity to enhance shareholder value by providing focused exposure to the best market for wireless infrastructure in the world with positive secular trends bolstered by 15% plus annualized growth in mobile data consumption, financially sound counterparties who are spending at a rate of $30 billion or more annually on network deployment and optimization, all leading to an environment that should drive tower growth for years to come.

最後，我想說的是，作為一家專注於提供一流客戶服務和更有效率運營的美國鐵塔公司，我們相信，透過專注於全球最佳無線基礎設施市場，我們將擁有一個獨特的機會來提升股東價值，該市場具有積極的長期趨勢，移動數據消費年化增長率達到 15% 以上，財務狀況良好的交易對手每年都將花費在網絡部署和優化上 300 億美元，所有未來的環境將創造未來幾年。

I also want to thank our employees who helped us achieve our fourth quarter and full year 2024 results. Your effort and focus enabled us to deliver solid revenue growth while significantly lowering operating costs and capital expenditures as we implemented revised operating plans and concluded the fiber strategic review.

我還要感謝幫助我們實現 2024 年第四季和全年業績的員工。當我們實施修訂後的營運計劃並完成光纖策略審查時，您的努力和關注使我們能夠實現穩健的收入成長，同時大幅降低營運成本和資本支出。

Finally, as you know, Dan Schlanger will be leaving Crown Castle at the end of this month, amazing that this will be his last earnings call. And I'd like to take the opportunity to thank Dan for the many contributions that he has made for our company over the last nine years, particularly in the past year, supporting me as I joined this company and for his work on the strategic review and transaction.

最後，如您所知，Dan Schlanger 將於本月底離開 Crown Castle，令人驚訝的是，這將是他最後一次財報電話會議。我想藉此機會感謝丹在過去九年裡為我們公司做出的諸多貢獻，特別是在過去的一年裡，感謝他支持我加入這家公司，並感謝他在戰略審查和交易方面所做的工作。

I know I can speak for everyone at Crown Castle. Dan, we wish you all the best in your next endeavors. Now we'll turn it over to Dan to walk us through the details on the quarter.

我知道我可以代表皇冠城堡的每個人發言。丹，我們祝福你在接下來的努力中一切順利。現在我們請丹向我們介紹本季的詳細資訊。

Thanks, Steven. I appreciate the kind words. Good afternoon, everyone. As Steven mentioned, we delivered fourth quarter and full year 2024 results in line with expectations, and we continued to perform well after implementing the meaningful changes in our operating plan announced in June.

謝謝，史蒂文。我很感激這些善意的話語。大家下午好。正如史蒂文所提到的，我們第四季和 2024 年全年的業績符合預期，並且在實施 6 月宣布的營運計劃中的重大變更後，我們繼續表現良好。

Our solid fourth quarter results included 4.5% consolidated organic growth, which was driven by an increase in demand across our portfolio of towers, small cells, and fiber solutions. Partially offsetting our strong organic growth during 2024, we incurred $10 million of higher-than-expected advisory fees in the fourth quarter that impacted both adjusted EBITDA and AFFO. These fees related to our ongoing strategic review and resulted in full year 2024 total advisory fees of $40 million related to both our strategic review and the proxy fight earlier in the year.

我們第四季的業績表現穩健，其中綜合有機成長 4.5%，這得益於我們對塔、小型基地台和光纖解決方案組合的需求成長。第四季度，我們產生的諮詢費高於預期 1000 萬美元，這部分抵消了我們 2024 年強勁的有機成長，影響了調整後的 EBITDA 和 AFFO。這些費用與我們正在進行的策略審查有關，並導致 2024 年全年總諮詢費為 4000 萬美元，與我們的策略審查和今年早些時候的代理權爭奪戰有關。

Turning to our 2025 outlook, as Steven mentioned, having an agreement to sell our fiber segment means that beginning in the first quarter of 2025, fiber segment historical results are required to be reported within Crown Castle's financial statements as discontinued operations.

談到我們的 2025 年展望，正如史蒂文所提到的，達成出售光纖部門的協議意味著從 2025 年第一季開始，光纖部門的歷史業績需要在 Crown Castle 的財務報表中作為已終止經營的業務進行報告。

As a result, the company's full year 2025 outlook does not include contributions from its fiber segment other than a net income and net income per share. There are a couple of items I want to point out about our 2025 outlook. First, all financing expenses remain with towers in our outlook and do not reflect the impact of any use of the proceeds from the sale of our fiber business. And second, SG&A has been allocated between towers and discontinued operations to develop our outlook. However, these allocations may not represent the run rate SG&A for Crown Castle as a stand-alone tower company.

因此，該公司 2025 年全年展望不包括其光纖部門除淨收入和每股淨收入以外的貢獻。關於我們的 2025 年展望，我想指出幾點。首先，在我們的展望中，所有融資費用仍與塔有關，並不反映出售光纖業務所得收益的影響。其次，銷售、一般及行政費用已在塔樓和停止運營之間分配，以發展我們的前景。然而，這些分配可能並不代表 Crown Castle 作為一家獨立塔式公司的銷售、一般及行政費用的運作率。

As a result of these items, adjusted EBITDA, AFFO, and AFFO per share in our 2025 outlook may not be representative of the company's anticipated performance following the close of the sale. On page 7 of our earnings materials, you can see a bridge from the AFFO provided in our 2025 outlook to a range of expected annual AFFO following the anticipated close of the transaction.

由於這些因素，我們 2025 年展望中的調整後 EBITDA、AFFO 和每股 AFFO 可能無法代表公司在出售完成後的預期業績。在我們的收益資料第 7 頁上，您可以看到從我們 2025 年展望中提供的 AFFO 到預計交易結束後的一系列預期年度 AFFO 之間的聯繫。

Starting with our 2025 outlook for AFFO of approximately $1.8 billion, we add back around $235 million for the reduction of interest expense based on using anticipated proceeds from the transaction to repay around $6 billion of debt at our current weighted average debt rate of 3.9%. Next, we see further improvements of about $310 million due to anticipated revenue growth and an adjustment to the SG&A to more accurately reflect the anticipated cost structure of a stand-alone tower company partially offset by incremental borrowing costs through transaction close.

從我們對 2025 年 AFFO 約 18 億美元的預期開始，我們加上約 2.35 億美元用於減少利息支出，這是基於使用交易預期收益以我們目前的加權平均債務利率 3.9% 償還約 60 億美元的債務。接下來，由於預期收入成長和銷售、一般及行政費用的調整，我們將看到約 3.1 億美元的進一步改善，以更準確地反映獨立塔公司的預期成本結構，但交易結束時的增量借貸成本部分抵消了這一改善。

Putting all this together results in an estimated annual AFFO at the anticipated close of the sale transaction of around $2.3 billion. Moving to our full-year 2025 outlook, we expect a solid, stable level of demand for our tower assets we experienced in 2024 to persist into 2025, resulting in a second consecutive year of 4.5% tower organic growth, excluding the impact of Sprint cancellations consisting of 2.8% from core leasing, 2.5% from escalators, and negative 0.8% from churn.

綜合考慮所有這些因素，預計銷售交易結束時的年度 AFFO 約為 23 億美元。展望 2025 年全年展望，我們預計 2024 年對鐵塔資產的強勁、穩定的需求水準將持續到 2025 年，從而連續第二年實現 4.5% 的鐵塔有機增長，這不包括 Sprint 取消的影響，包括核心租賃的 2.8%、自動扶梯的 2.5% 和客戶流失的負 0.8%。

As Steven mentioned, our definition of core leasing activity has historically included the impact of items unrelated to recurring leasing, such as tenant cancellation fees, and back billings to more accurately reflect changes to our recurring revenues, the impact from back billings will now be captured in other buildings, and the impact from revenues unrelated to recurring leasing will be captured in other revenues, which will also include the impact from Sprint cancellation and other early termination payments.

正如史蒂文所提到的，我們對核心租賃活動的定義歷來包括與經常性租賃無關的項目的影響，例如租戶取消費和回款賬單，以更準確地反映我們經常性收入的變化，現在將在其他建築物中捕獲來自回款賬單的影響，與經常性租賃無關的收入的影響將在其他收入中捕獲，其中還包括 Sprint 取消和其他提前付款的影響。

Under our revised definition, we expect tower core leasing activity of $110 million at the mid-point, which compares to $110 million in 2024 and results in $175 million of organic contributions to site rental billings excluding the impact of Sprint cancellations.

根據我們修訂後的定義，我們預計塔核心租賃活動的中間值為 1.1 億美元，而 2024 年為 1.1 億美元，並將將為站點租賃費用帶來 1.75 億美元的有機貢獻（不包括 Sprint 取消的影響）。

This growth is more than offset at site rental revenues due to the $205 million of Sprint cancellations Steven's mentioned and a decrease in non-cash straight line revenues and amortization of prepaid rent. We believe the underlying growth of the tower business combined with its efficient cost structure will generate sufficient AFFO excluding amortization of pre-paid rent upon close of the transaction to fund our dividend per share target of approximately $4.25 per share.

由於 Steven 提到的 Sprint 取消了 2.05 億美元的訂單，以及非現金直線收入和預付租金攤銷的減少，場地租金收入超過了這一增長。我們相信，塔式業務的潛在成長加上其高效的成本結構將在交易結束時產生足夠的 AFFO（不包括預付租金的攤提），以資助我們每股約 4.25 美元的股息目標。

We believe the target annualized dividend per share of approximately $4.25 is consistent with the dividend policy Steven discussed earlier of setting our dividend at approximately 75% to 80% of the annual AFFO, excluding amortization of pre-paid rent following the close of the transaction.

我們認為，每股約 4.25 美元的目標年度股息與 Steven 先前討論的股息政策一致，即將股息設定為年度 AFFO 的約 75% 至 80%，不包括交易結束後預付租金的攤銷。

Turning to the balance sheet, we ended the quarter with significant liquidity and flexibility, positioning us to efficiently maintain our investment grade rating after the sale of the fiber business based on the target capital structure and capital allocation framework Steven mentioned earlier.

談到資產負債表，我們在本季結束時擁有充足的流動性和靈活性，這使我們能夠根據史蒂文之前提到的目標資本結構和資本配置框架，在出售光纖業務後有效地維持我們的投資級評級。

In conclusion, we delivered solid results in full year 2024, and we expect to deliver similar tower organic in full year 2025 as we continue to benefit from the persistent increase in mobile data demand. I believe in the long term strength of the tower business model, and I also believe the US continues to be the best market in the world for wireless infrastructure ownership.

總而言之，我們在 2024 年全年取得了穩健的業績，並且由於我們繼續受益於行動數據需求的持續成長，我們預計 2025 年全年也將實現類似的塔有機成長。我相信塔式商業模式的長期實力，我也相信美國將繼續成為全球無線基礎設施所有權的最佳市場。

The sale of our fiber segment positions Crown Castle as the only public pure-play US tower company, and I believe this is the best outcome for driving shareholder value. Thank you to all the Crown Castle team who worked diligently to conclude the strategic review and for all the team members who helped deliver the company deliver our solid fourth quarter and full year 2024 results.

出售我們的光纖部門使 Crown Castle 成為唯一一家上市的美國純鐵塔公司，我相信這是推動股東價值的最佳結果。感謝 Crown Castle 團隊全體成員辛勤工作完成策略評估，也感謝所有團隊成員幫助公司實現穩健的第四季和 2024 年全年業績。

Finally, I'd like to express my sincere appreciation to everyone at Crown Castle. You've made the last nine years the best years of my professional life. You're a dedicated and talented team and a wonderful group of people. I'm going to miss working with you and wish you all nothing but the very best. With that, Darcy, I'd like to open the line for questions.

最後，我要向皇冠城堡的每一位同仁表達最誠摯的感謝。您讓過去的九年成為我職涯中最美好的時光。你們是一支敬業且才華洋溢的團隊，也是一群很棒的人。我會懷念與你們一起工作的時光，並祝福你們一切順利。達西，現在我開始回答問題。

Thank you. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) Simon Flannery, Morgan Stanley.

謝謝。我們現在開始問答環節。（操作員指示） 摩根士丹利的西蒙·弗蘭納裡。

Thank you so much and let me add my best wishes down to your future endeavors. Great working with you, Steven. Thank you. Thanks for all the color. Very helpful. In the past, the company has expressed interest in developed market opportunities for macro towers. I guess, years ago you had an investment in Australia, but is that off the table now? Are you pretty much locked into the US, or might you be interested in something in Europe if the right opportunity arose? And then down back to the organic growth, as we go forward here and get past a lot of these one-time items like Sprint churn, if we take a mid-single digit organic growth number, is it fair to say that the AFFO per share growth should be in that mid-to-high single digits and that the dividend per share should also be in that sort of trajectory on a kind of medium-term basis?

非常感謝您，請允許我向您未來的努力致以最良好的祝愿。很高興與您合作，史蒂文。謝謝。感謝所有的色彩。非常有幫助。過去，該公司曾表示對宏塔的已開發市場機會感興趣。我想，幾年前您在澳洲有投資，但現在沒有投資了嗎？您基本上是否被困在美國境內，或者如果有合適的機會，您是否會對歐洲的某些事物感興趣？然後回到有機成長，隨著我們繼續前進並克服許多一次性專案（例如 Sprint 客戶流失），如果我們採用中等個位數的有機成長數字，是否可以公平地說，每股 AFFO 成長率應該處於中等到高個位數，並且每股股息也應該在中期基礎上保持這種軌跡？

Simon, let me take the first question, which I appreciate about the potential of inorganic growth opportunities. Yeah, I mean, listen, we love the tower business. We're focused in the US and we have a lot of work to do over the next 12 to 15 months to make sure we deliver a great product to the two buyers that we're selling to on the fiber side and also deliver results for the tower business and continue to set ourselves up for even greater success as we go into 2026.

西蒙，讓我來回答第一個問題，我很欣賞無機成長機會的潛力。是的，我的意思是，聽著，我們熱愛塔業務。我們的重點是美國，未來 12 到 15 個月我們還有很多工作要做，以確保我們向光纖方面的兩個買家提供優質的產品，並為塔業務帶來成果，並繼續為 2026 年取得更大的成功做好準備。

So right now, that's really the focus. It doesn't mean that we wouldn't be looking at inbound opportunities. I'm not sure if I'd be spending a lot of time on a plane going over and try to uncover things in Europe or developed markets, but if there's things that come to us, we would look at it, we'd evaluate it, we'd see what type of opportunity it presents to create shareholder value. We discuss it with the board of directors. And we just come to some type of conclusion. So we'd like to be opportunistic. It's just -- part of it's about timing and price.

所以現在，這才是真正的重點。這並不意味著我們不會尋找入境機會。我不確定我是否會花很多時間坐飛機去歐洲或已開發市場尋找機會，但如果有新機會出現，我們就會研究它、評估它，看看它能帶來什麼樣的機會來創造股東價值。我們與董事會討論此事。我們只是得出了某種結論。因此，我們願意抓住機會。這只是——部分與時機和價格有關。

Makes sense. Simon, on the second question, we just went out with our with our 2025 guidance. We're going to keep it at that for now, which is we think we're going to get 4.5% growth in the tower business.

有道理。西蒙，關於第二個問題，我們剛剛發布了 2025 年的指導方針。目前我們將保持這一水平，我們認為塔業務將實現 4.5% 的成長。

As you pointed out, there is operating leverage in this business, and it is the intention to have dividend per share growth that mirrors AFFO per share growth over time. As Steven mentioned earlier, at about 75% to 80% of AFFO excluding prepaid rent amortization. So the dividend growth will be in line with that AFFO growth as we move forward.

正如您所指出的，這項業務存在經營槓桿，其目的是使每股股息的成長與每股 AFFO 的成長同步。正如史蒂文之前提到的，不包括預付租金攤銷，約佔 AFFO 的 75% 到 80%。因此，隨著我們前進，股息成長將與 AFFO 成長保持一致。

Great. Thank you so much.

偉大的。太感謝了。

Thank you. Michael Rowlands, Citi.

謝謝。花旗銀行的麥可羅蘭茲 (Michael Rowlands)。

Thanks and good afternoon. I also want to express my thanks and best wishes to Dan.

謝謝，下午好。我也要向丹表達我的感謝和祝福。

Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it. It's been great working with you.

謝謝，麥克。我很感激。和你一起工作很愉快。

And just a few questions. So first, it seems appropriate as you're focusing now on domestic towers to ask a bit about the leasing activity that you're seeing within that $110 million for 2025. And if you could share if there's any differences whether it's in the shaping of that over the course of the year in terms of where it may be coming from? I think you mentioned densification earlier and just curious the types of activity that you're seeing this year that may differ from last year.

我還有幾個問題。首先，既然您現在關注的是國內塔，那麼詢問一下您在 2025 年 1.1 億美元預算中看到的租賃活動似乎是合適的。您是否可以分享是否存在任何差異，這些差異是否在一年的時間內形成，以及可能來自哪裡？我想您之前提到過緻密化，只是好奇今年看到的活動類型可能與去年有所不同。

And then secondly, on capital allocation, as you look at managing the fiber business as a discontinued operation through close, can you give us a sense of what the base case assumption is, for how much free cash flow that business could contribute or consume for Crown Castle? Thanks.

其次，關於資本配置，當您將光纖業務視為一項已停止運營的業務時，您能否讓我們了解一下基本情況假設是什麼，即該業務可以為 Crown Castle 貢獻或消耗多少自由現金流？謝謝。

Sure, Michael, thanks for the questions. You know, I guess, I'd start off by saying that from an application perspective and we don't give out specific numbers but we have seen a sequential increase in applications kind of through our pipeline, I'd say, from Q4 you know today but it's not enough for us to necessarily forecast any significant change for this year versus the 4.5% growth that we've mentioned.

當然，邁克爾，謝謝你的提問。你知道，我想，我首先要從申請的角度說，我們不會給出具體的數字，但從今天的第四季度開始，我們看到透過我們的管道申請的數量呈連續增長，但這不足以讓我們預測今年與我們提到的 4.5% 的增長率相比會發生任何重大變化。

And the largest contributors to the applications that we're seeing are continued deployments by carriers of their mid-band spectrum. They're primarily using the rest of their C-band spectrum, to add and swap out equipment that supports their 5G initiatives.

我們看到的應用的最大貢獻者是營運商對其中頻譜頻譜的持續部署。他們主要使用剩餘的 C 波段頻譜來添加和更換支援其 5G 計劃的設備。

So most of what we're seeing still is overlays. There is some activity that's brewing, but I'll be brewing lightly, of co-locations or first time installs. We'll see how that develops over time and maybe toward the back half of the year, but just also appreciate from an activity perspective with us.

因此我們看到的大部分內容仍然是覆蓋。有一些活動正在醞釀中，但我會輕描淡寫地進行共置或首次安裝。我們將觀察其隨著時間的推移如何發展，也許是在今年下半年，但也會從活動的角度欣賞。

When it comes to revenue, most of our revenue is baked into our comprehensive master lease agreements. So again, we -- the good news is we provide, relative stability and visibility in terms of our outlook. So we don't anticipate any type of significant, going outside that range in any significant way.

說到收入，我們的大部分收入都包含在綜合主租賃協議中。所以，好消息是，就前景而言，我們提供了相對的穩定性和可見度。因此，我們預計不會出現任何重大的、超出該範圍的情況。

I hope that answers your question.

我希望這能回答你的問題。

It does.

確實如此。

Thanks. Okay. I'll take the second one, on free cash flow from the fiber segment. We intend to operate this business in the ordinary course as Steven mentioned during the prepared remarks. And what that's going to mean is we think we can drive a similar level of activity through the business in 2025 is what we saw in 2024. And as you know as part of that discontinued operations, we've given net income, as well as the CapEx associated with the business. And we think that the free cash flow generation under that treatment is going to be very similar in 2025 as it was in 24, and that's going to be in the neighborhood of $250 million positive for the year.

謝謝。好的。我選擇第二個問題，關於光纖部分的自由現金流。正如史蒂文在準備好的發言中提到的那樣，我們打算以正常方式經營這項業務。這意味著我們認為我們可以在 2025 年推動與 2024 年類似的業務活動水準。如您所知，作為停止經營的一部分，我們給出了淨收入以及與業務相關的資本支出。我們認為，按照這種處理方式，2025 年的自由現金流產生將與 24 年非常相似，全年將達到 2.5 億美元左右。

Thank you. Rick Prentice, Raymond James.

謝謝。瑞克普倫蒂斯、雷蒙詹姆斯。

Thanks, everybody. Yeah, Dan, I'll echo that too. Enjoyed working with you and glad you were there to help get everybody over the finish line here.

謝謝大家。是的，丹，我也同意這一點。很高興與您合作，很高興您能幫助大家完成任務。

You and me both, Rick, it's been a pleasure.

里克，你和我都很高興。

Yeah. And, yeah, obviously, the finish line looks really similar to what we were thinking. One aspect was, were you thinking at all of keeping small cells or even a stake of small cells because there is some excitement about densification and, or was it just going to be too complicated to try and keep a stake in the small cell?

是的。是的，顯然，終點線看起來與我們想像的非常相似。一方面是，您是否考慮過保留小型基地台，或保留一部分小型基地台，因為人們對密集化感到興奮，還是說，嘗試保留小型基地台的股份會太複雜？

Yeah, I mean, Rick, it's a great question. I mean, again, we assessed different offers, different structures from financial buyers, from strategic buyers, you know, how I feel about the small cell business from the past, and it's a great business and has lots of opportunity into the future. But from our perspective, the board had to make the evaluation and felt that if they can get a fair value for that business, then it made sense to sell it, monetize it, and then use those proceeds to help grow and maximize shareholder value for the US tower business.

是的，里克，這是一個很好的問題。我的意思是，我們再次評估了來自金融買家和戰略買家的不同報價和不同結構，你知道，我對過去小型基地台業務的看法是，這是一項偉大的業務，未來有很多機會。但從我們的角度來看，董事會必須做出評估，並認為如果他們能夠為該業務獲得公平的價值，那麼出售它、將其貨幣化，然後使用這些收益來幫助美國塔業務增長和最大化股東價值是有意義的。

Okay. And then it talks about the deal. We did see from ZAO that they're saying the fiber side is $4.25 billion, implying that the small cell is $4.25 billion. Is it one transaction with two parties? Is it separate transactions? And how should we think about kind of the long poles in the tent to getting the approval process?

好的。然後談論交易。我們確實從 ZAO 看到，他們說光纖的收入為 42.5 億美元，這意味著小型基地台的收入為 42.5 億美元。這是涉及兩方的一筆交易嗎？這是單獨交易嗎？我們應該如何考慮帳篷裡的長桿來獲得批准流程？

So it's one transaction, one purchase price, two parties involved. And we'll have to go through the typical regulatory processes, which is, Hart-Scott-Rodino and also working with the states on the agreements that we have to get those agreements to be transferred over to the new businesses on both sides.

因此，這是一筆交易，一個購買價格，涉及兩方。我們必須遵循典型的監管流程，即哈特-斯科特-羅迪諾法案，同時也要與各州合作達成協議，將這些協議轉移到雙方的新企業。

Okay. And that, yeah, I'm sorry. I was just saying that the process takes a little bit longer, particularly when you're dealing with certain states out there, as we know, and that's why we're projecting this to be probably a 12-to-15 month close.

好的。是的，我很抱歉。我只是說這個過程需要更長的時間，特別是當你與某些州打交道時，正如我們所知，這就是為什麼我們預計這可能需要 12 到 15 個月的時間才能完成。

Okay. Well, and last one for me. Is the leverage you talk about targeting 6.0, 6.5? Have you gotten any confirmation from the rate agencies that they do view that as investment grade zone, particularly as they also might consider the final purchase options?

好的。好吧，對我來說這是最後一個了。您所說的槓桿目標是 6.0 還是 6.5？您是否從評級機構得到任何確認，他們確實將其視為投資等級區域，特別是因為他們也可能會考慮最終的購買選擇？

I mean, there has been some discussions with the rating agencies. And again, the preliminary analysis has us at least believing as a pure-play US tower business with our type of superior free cash flow, we should be able to maintain investment-grade credit with target leverage between 6 times and 6.5 times.

我的意思是，我們已經與評級機構進行了一些討論。而且，初步分析讓我們至少相信，作為一家純粹的美國塔式業務公司，憑藉我們優越的自由現金流，我們應該能夠維持投資級信用，目標槓桿率在 6 倍至 6.5 倍之間。

Okay, thanks guys. And again, I'm glad you reached the finish line. And Dan, glad you were there to get it done and best wishes.

好的，謝謝大家。再次，我很高興你到達了終點線。丹，很高興你能完成這件事，並致以最良好的祝愿。

Thanks, Ric. You too.

謝謝，里克。你也是。

Thank you. Brendan Lynch, Barclays.

謝謝。巴克萊銀行的布倫丹·林奇。

Great, thank you for taking my questions. Maybe you could talk a little bit about the time frame for the $3 billion of repurchases and your thought process around repurchases versus other options such as a special dividend?

太好了，謝謝你回答我的問題。也許您可以稍微談談 30 億美元回購的時間框架，以及您對回購與其他選擇（例如特別股息）的思考過程？

Yeah, I mean, again, the way we're going to prioritize in terms of the capital allocation is CapEx, right? Is CapEx spending that we believe is going to maximize investment returns for us, then debt reductions dividend payments, and buybacks. I mean that's kind of the order. So we feel there's ample opportunity in those areas to be able to generate lots of shareholder value and every decision that we make in size is going to go through two different kind of three gates. We have a capital committee here within the management team of the company. We have a finance committee that was formed at the board level and we have the board.

是的，我的意思是，我們在資本配置方面優先考慮的方式是資本支出，對嗎？我們認為資本支出將為我們帶來最大的投資回報，然後是債務削減、股息支付和回購。我的意思是這是一種命令。因此，我們認為這些領域有充足的機會來創造大量的股東價值，而我們在規模上所做的每一個決定都將經歷兩個不同的三個關口。我們公司的管理團隊中有一個資本委員會。我們有一個在董事會層級成立的財務委員會，我們還有董事會。

So we're going to have kind of on a quarterly basis, post closing lots of discussions about how we spend our capital and be very disciplined in our approach.

因此，我們將在每個季度結束後進行大量關於如何使用資本的討論，並嚴格遵守我們的方法。

Okay, thank you. I would just -- I would follow up a bit on the time frame obviously what Steven mentioned is, or one of us mentioned is a $3 billion, approximately $3 billion share repurchase intention for when the transaction closes. We're far away from that. So it's hard to say what we're going to do when that comes. It's going to be what we think is the best, in the best interest of the shareholders and subject to what the board wants to do at the time.

好的，謝謝。我只是——我會稍微跟進一下時間框架，顯然史蒂文提到的，或者我們其中一人提到的是交易結束時 30 億美元、約 30 億美元的股票回購意向。我們離那還很遠。因此，很難說當這種情況發生時我們將會做什麼。我們認為這將是最好的選擇，符合股東的最佳利益，並取決於董事會當時的意願。

And thinking about repurchases for special dividends, I think that we think of it kind of as the best way to maximize value is to provide a regular dividend and provide opportunistic flexibility to pursue all the things that Steven mentioned in terms of allocation of capital and that includes CapEx or some sort of share repurchase. And we'll leave the dividend most likely in the regular dividend, but I think looking at a special dividend over time won't be off the table. It just -- we believe that at this point, a share repurchase seems like a better way to return the capital share.

考慮到特別股息的回購，我認為我們認為最大化價值的最佳方式是提供定期股息並提供機會靈活性來追求史蒂文在資本配置方面提到的所有事情，其中​​包括資本支出或某種形式的股票回購。我們很可能將股息保留在常規股息中，但我認為隨著時間的推移，考慮特別股息也是可能的。只是——我們認為，就目前情況而言，股票回購似乎是返還資本份額的更好方式。

Great, thank you. That's helpful. And maybe just a clarification question on the Sprint churn beyond 2025, Steve, you mentioned that there was some lingering components beyond the $205 million this year. You just, clarify how we should think about that.

太好了，謝謝。這很有幫助。也許只是想澄清一下關於 2025 年以後 Sprint 的客戶流失問題，史蒂夫，你提到今年除了 2.05 億美元之外還有一些揮之不去的因素。你只是澄清一下我們應該如何看待這個問題。

Sure, yes, I mean, the, we, we've mentioned in the past that our churn rate, into the future was, to be expected in the 1% to 2% range. And I thought it'd be best at this time to just be more granular, and just call out the Sprint churn in particular, which is about $20 million. Again, starting in 2026, just to clarify what was included in that range. So I guess again, think of our long-term range as I mentioned as being around 1%.

當然，是的，我的意思是，我們過去曾提到過，我們未來的客戶流失率預計在 1% 到 2% 的範圍內。我認為此時最好是更詳細說明，並特別指出 Sprint 的客戶流失，約 2000 萬美元。再次強調，從 2026 年開始，只是為了澄清該範圍內所包含的內容。所以我再次猜測，正如我所提到的，我們的長期範圍大約是 1%。

And the Sprint churn being 40 basis points to 50 basis points starting in 2026.

從 2026 年開始，Sprint 的客戶流失率將達到 40 個基點至 50 個基點。

Great, that's helpful. Thank you very much and then it's been a pleasure working with you. All the best going forward with whatever comes next.

太好了，很有幫助。非常感謝您，很高興與您合作。無論接下來發生什麼，祝一切順利。

Thank you very much appreciate it.

非常感謝。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Nick Del Deo, MoffettNathanson.

尼克·德爾·迪奧，莫菲特·內桑森。

Hey guys, and first off, Dan, again, thank you for all the time and insights you've shared with us over the years and best of luck in whatever you choose to do next. Thank you very much.

嘿，夥計們，首先，丹，再次感謝你多年來與我們分享的時間和見解，祝你接下來選擇的任何事都好運。非常感謝。

Now Steven, you talked about the opportunity to improve market shares, one of your strategic priorities going forward. I think a lot of folks think of this business on a tower-by-tower basis. You're kind of either there or you're not, and there tends not to be a lot of competing towers within a relevant radii. So through that lens, how are you thinking about the opportunity to boost the share of cell sites you host?

現在，史蒂文，您談到了提高市場份額的機會，這是您未來的策略重點之一。我認為很多人都是以逐座塔為基礎來考慮這項業務的。你要么在那裡，要么不在，在相關半徑內往往不會有很多競爭塔。那麼從這個角度來看，您如何看待提高您所託管的基地台份額的機會？

Well, we're, again, we're trying to maximize the share of revenue that's out there and in terms of boosting market share, part of that comes from delivering better service, right? I mean, if we could really be known as the company out there that each of the major wireless carriers and the regional carriers want to choose first.

好吧，我們再次嘗試最大化現有的收入份額，就提高市場份額而言，部分原因是提供更好的服務，對嗎？我的意思是，如果我們真的能夠成為各大無線營運商和區域營運商都想先選擇的公司。

There are some sites that are competing out there, as and so ideally based on the way in which we perform and the confidence level that we have with our customers and the MLAs that we have structured with our customers, and the speed and the quality that we deliver to our customers on a day-to-day basis, that they would want to have their RF engineers, RF with our sites in mind first.

有一些網站正在那裡競爭，因此理想情況下，基於我們的表現方式和我們對客戶的信任水平以及我們與客戶構建的 MLA，以及我們每天向客戶提供的速度和質量，他們希望他們的 RF 工程師首先考慮我們的站點的 RF。

And so again, some of the things I just mentioned are really critical for us to continue to enhance in order for the customers to look at us as being the most essential player in this business in the US.

因此，我剛才提到的一些事情對於我們繼續加強確實至關重要，以便讓客戶將我們視為美國該行業最重要的參與者。

And kind of always target a Crown Castle site first in terms of a co-location. Obviously, with the overlays, there's not much of a choice because they're doing upgrades. It's when they densify or it's when they add coverage.

並且就共置地點而言，總是先瞄準皇冠城堡地點。顯然，由於他們正在進行升級，因此對於覆蓋來說沒有太多選擇。這是當他們增加密度或增加覆蓋範圍時。

Now the other thing I would say is, we haven't played in the new tower bill game in a long time. We haven't played in the inorganic Tower M&A game in a long time. So we're going to be putting more effort, more thought around that. There are some customers of ours who would like us to do building for them, as they're trying to expand in certain markets, where we have economies of scale also. So we're going to be looking at that and thinking about how we could put together some agreements. And some opportunities that leverage our abilities and our relationships and also provide good returns long term for our shareholders.

現在我想說的另一件事是，我們已經很久沒有玩過新的塔樓帳單遊戲了。我們已經很久沒有參與無機 Tower 併購遊戲了。因此，我們將為此投入更多努力、更多思考。我們的一些客戶希望我們為他們建造建築，因為他們正試圖在某些市場擴張，而我們在這些市場也具有規模經濟。因此，我們將研究這個問題並思考如何達成一些協議。一些機會可以利用我們的能力和關係，並為我們的股東帶來長期良好的回報。

Okay, that that's helpful. Thank you, Steven. Can I ask one about unallocated SG&A as well, in the slide where you kind of bridge to the estimated AFFO at transaction close, you seem to assume that a lot of the unallocated SG&A eventually goes away. I guess, can you help to mention how much of that you think you can eventually get rid of and over what sort of time frame?

好的，這很有幫助。謝謝你，史蒂文。我能否也問一個關於未分配的銷售、一般和行政費用 (SG&A) 的問題，在幻燈片中，您在交易結束時將橋接到估計的 AFFO，您似乎假設很多未分配的銷售、一般和行政費用最終都會消失。我想，您能否幫忙說明您認為最終可以擺脫多少，以及需要多長時間？

Yeah, I'm not exactly sure how you got to that conclusion, Nick, but I can tell you that there's the bar you're talking about, which is kind of the third bar from the left on that page 7 is a combination of several different impacts to our business it's revenue growth, it's cost reductions and interest expense.

是的，我不太清楚你是如何得出這個結論的，尼克，但我可以告訴你，你所說的那個條形圖，也就是第 7 頁左邊第三條形圖，是對我們業務的幾種不同影響的組合，即收入增長、成本降低和利息支出。

As we said, I think that there will be some reductions over time to appropriately sized towards the tower only business and you can maybe get a range of that from the bar, but we're not going to get right now into the specifics of how that's going to go until we get further along in the process.

正如我們所說的，我認為隨著時間的推移，將會有一些削減，以適當地適應僅限塔的業務，你也許可以從酒吧獲得一個範圍，但我們現在不會討論具體如何進行，直到我們進一步推進這一進程。

Yeah, we, I mean, we have there's a lot of opportunity for the employee base of this company, through these transactions and we have a good amount of time between now and the closing to work with both EQT and with ZAO on needs.

是的，我的意思是，透過這些交易，我們為該公司的員工群體提供了大量機會，而且從現在到交易結束，我們有足夠的時間與 EQT 和 ZAO 合作滿足需求。

And there's also a lot of opportunity for folks at Tower as we want to continue to enhance our business and grow our business and expand our business.

由於我們希望繼續增強、發展和擴大我們的業務，因此 Tower 的員工也有很多機會。

So I agree with Dan. We're always going to be looking at opportunities to focus on cost management, what that means from a SG&A or a corporate perspective on a post-closing basis time will tell and we'll obviously update you as we make decisions.

所以我同意丹的觀點。我們將始終尋找機會專注於成本管理，從銷售、一般及行政費用 (SG&A) 或公司角度來看，在交易結束後這意味著什麼，時間會告訴我們答案，我們會在做出決定時及時向您通報最新情況。

Okay.

好的。

Great, thank you both.

太好了，謝謝你們兩位。

Thank you. Jim Schneider, Goldman Sachs.

謝謝。高盛的吉姆·施耐德。

Thanks for taking my question and thanks to you, Dan, and best wishes on your future endeavors. Maybe just -- maybe, would love to see if you could talk a little bit about your organic growth strategy for towers in the US business for a minute and then talk about your intention to sort of diversify or go more aggressively against opportunities in rural areas where maybe under next today, maybe talk about how aggressively to your earlier reactor you might want to go after the tower build opportunity. And then, maybe in the second part of the question the $150 million to $200 million and go forward, how do you think about that, beyond this year? You've mentioned land, but how do you think about how that splits out over time?

感謝您回答我的問題，也謝謝您，丹，祝您未來一切順利。也許只是 - 也許，我很想看看您是否可以稍微談一下您在美國業務中塔的有機增長戰略，然後談談您打算進行多元化發展或更積極地抓住農村地區的機會，也許在今天，也許可以談談您可能希望如何積極地追逐您之前的反應堆塔建設機會。然後，也許問題的第二部分是 1.5 億美元到 2 億美元，並且繼續增長，您如何看待今年以後的情況？您提到了土地，但您認為隨著時間的推移土地將如何分配？

Yeah, I didn't get the first. Can you just repeat the first part of the question? I got about the rural and about the built-to-suit and about the CapEx. The first was about just carrier demand or --

是的，我沒有得到第一名。你能重複問題的第一部分嗎？我了解了鄉村、客製化建築和資本支出。第一個是關於運營商需求或--

It was the rural opportunity.

這是農村的機會。

Okay, about the rural, we're starting to evaluate that, Jim. On the rural side, most of our footprint, as is urban and suburban and corridor driven. We don't have a lot of steel and parcels of land in rural America. Other companies that we compete with do.

好的，關於農村，我們開始評估這一點，吉姆。在農村地區，我們的大部分足跡都是由城市、郊區和走廊驅動的。美國農村地區沒有太多的鋼鐵和土地。與我們競爭的其他公司也這麼做。

So the question for us is what -- which carriers are going into that -- into those markets. Is there opportunity for co-location versus just having a single stick with a single carrier on it and what are the economics involved. We feel very comfortable in our ability to be able to do the site acquisition, zoning and permitting and the construction of building sites and doing it with speed and quality.

因此，我們的問題是，哪些業者正在進入這些市場。是否有機會進行共置，而不是只與單一運營商合作，所涉及的經濟效益如何。我們對自己能夠快速、高品質地完成場地收購、分區和許可以及建築工地建設的能力感到非常滿意。

The real opportunity -- the real question comes down to what type of economics will we be able to work out where we feel it's a good investment for the business both in the short run and also over the long term horizon.

真正的機會－真正的問題歸結為我們能夠制定出什麼樣的經濟方案，讓我們覺得無論從短期或長期來看，這對企業來說都是一項好的投資。

In terms of the capital, a chunk of that capital is going to be going to land, which we're trying to really gear up on because we think there's some good opportunity there and again it helps secure the asset for us. It helps drive co-location more quickly. And it helps improve our margins.

就資本而言，其中很大一部分將用於購買土地，我們正努力抓住這個機會，因為我們認為那裡有一些很好的機會，而且這有助於我們確保資產的安全。它有助於更快地推動共置。這有助於提高我們的利潤率。

The balance of it is corporate -- is corporate capital that would be invested again both to help improve our systems and other kind of smaller areas of focus for the company.

它的平衡是企業——是企業資本，將再次投資以幫助改善我們的系統和公司其他較小的重點領域。

Thank you. Brandon Nispel, KeyBanc Capital Markets.

謝謝。布蘭登‧尼斯佩爾 (Brandon Nispel)，KeyBanc 資本市場。

Great, thanks for taking the question, Steven. I was hoping you could talk about some of the operational, initiatives that you might do and from a financial standpoint, where do you think something like EBITDA of margins can go over the long term? And I ask because one of your peers is also sort of doing, an exercise to try to drive out costs in the business, but try -- and we can see where your EBITDA margin is this year on the tower business. So where do you think it goes long term? Thanks.

太好了，謝謝你回答這個問題，史蒂文。我希望您能談談您可能採取的一些營運舉措，從財務角度來看，您認為 EBITDA 利潤率從長遠來看會達到什麼水平？我之所以問這個問題，是因為您的一位同事也在嘗試降低業務成本，我們可以看到您今年在塔式業務上的 EBITDA 利潤率是多少。那麼您認為它的長期發展前景如何？謝謝。

Yeah, I mean, I'll start with the second one. I mean, it's tough for me to sit here and try to quantify, where the bit of margins are going to go. I'd like to say that they're going to go up, and but you know I'm not going to give any type of number of basis points or whatever. I'm just going to say that we're going to be working very hard to drive margin. I think again one of the initiatives that I've mentioned a number of times here and that Cathy Piche, who's the leader of our tower business, is very focused on with her team, is the real estate and in trying to remove the issues that we find impact our margins, which is, dealing with landlords toward end of terms where they want much higher rents.

是的，我的意思是，我將從第二個開始。我的意思是，我很難坐在這裡嘗試量化利潤的去向。我想說它們會上漲，但你知道我不會給出任何基點數或其他什麼。我只是想說，我們將竭盡全力提高利潤率。我再次想到，我在這裡多次提到的其中一項舉措，也是我們塔業務負責人 Cathy Piche 和她的團隊非常關注的，就是房地產，並試圖消除我們發現影響我們利潤率的問題，也就是在租期結束時與想要更高租金的房東打交道。

So ideally we're going to be able to sink capital there, have good investments, and that'll help incrementally improve our margin. I think another area based on our scale and size is in R&M, which is again, another big area of our expense structure. So the more that we can do with our operations, leadership team to help and our supply chain team to help drive more economies of scale as we're doing work out in the field, I think would be a way for us to improve margin, and that's again on the operating side.

因此理想情況下，我們將能夠在那裡投入資本，進行良好的投資，這將有助於逐步提高我們的利潤率。我認為，根據我們的規模和大小，另一個領域是研發與管理，這也是我們費用結構的另一個重要領域。因此，我認為，當我們在現場工作時，我們的營運、領導團隊和供應鏈團隊能夠做的越多，就越能推動規模經濟，這對我們來說是一種提高利潤率的方法，而這又是在營運方面。

In terms of some things that we're working on, we -- I've talked about this before. We have -- we're renovating our processes to some degree, and where we have certain projects that we're working on to enhance the application process flow, really kind of from application to installation, to make that quicker and easier to make sure the data is correct. We're doing a lot of drone work which I've mentioned in the past to help digitize our assets. I think we're about halfway through at this point.

就我們正在進行的一些工作而言，我之前已經談過這個問題。我們正在一定程度上革新我們的流程，我們正在進行某些專案來增強從申請到安裝的整個流程，以便更快、更輕鬆地確保資料的正確性。我們正在進行大量無人機工作，我之前曾提到過，以幫助實現我們的資產數位化。我認為我們現在已經完成一半了。

And those are expecting to deliver again good ROIs because it really helps us be able to very quickly in the future identify what's on the tower obviously and what the wind loads are and how those match against our holistic agreements so carriers can deploy more quickly and the quicker the more quickly they can deploy that helps accelerate revenue for us.

這些預計將再次帶來良好的投資回報率，因為它確實幫助我們能夠在未來非常快速地識別塔上的內容、風荷載是什麼以及這些與我們的整體協議如何匹配，以便運營商可以更快地部署，部署速度越快，就越快，這有助於我們加速收入。

And we're also trying to toy around a little bit with some AI tools. One of our -- one of the companies that we work with on that supplies systems for work flows has some pretty neat predictive analysis tools and so we're trying to incorporate that in again, back into kind of the property and asset management part of the business. So we can get kind of quicker turnaround times and have less error rates. So those are -- I guess, a few examples.

我們也在嘗試使用一些人工智慧工具。我們合作的一家提供工作流程系統的公司擁有一些非常巧妙的預測分析工具，因此我們正嘗試將其重新納入業務的財產和資產管理部分。因此我們可以獲得更快的周轉時間並降低錯誤率。所以我想這些只是一些例子。

Thanks for taking the question.

感謝您回答這個問題。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Thank you. Batya Levi, UBS.

謝謝。巴蒂亞·列維（Batya Levi），瑞銀。

Great, thank you. Just a couple of quick follow-ups. I'm assuming that there isn't any tax consequences with the sale but just to confirm that and maybe just going back to the AFFO bridge this year includes maybe a bit of one-time items you mentioned, the $40 million legal spend. Anything else that you could quantify in terms of the stranded cost? And looking at that slide 7 again, the $250 million to $370 million of growth is a bit of a wide range. What's that dependent on and if you could provide a rough split of revenue growth versus SG&A adjustments will be great.

太好了，謝謝。只需進行一些快速的跟進。我假設此次出售不會產生任何稅務後果，但只是為了確認這一點，也許今年回到 AFFO 橋，可能包括您提到的一些一次性項目，即 4000 萬美元的法律支出。您還能量化擱淺成本嗎？再來看第 7 張投影片，2.5 億美元到 3.7 億美元的成長範圍有點大。這取決於什麼？如果您能提供收入成長與銷售、一般及行政費用調整的粗略劃分，那就太好了。

Thank you.

謝謝。

Yeah, we don't believe there are going to be any significant tax consequences to the deal. So I can confirm that. As you mentioned Batya, in 2024, we had $40 million of costs associated with our advisory costs that we do not believe will recur. We were also able, as we talked about, to take out about $100 million of annualized costs from our moves in June, about $35 million of which will be incremental in 2025. And those cost savings are offset, somewhat by our -- as regular cost structure.

是的，我們認為這筆交易不會帶來任何重大的稅務後果。所以我可以確認這一點。正如您所提到的 Batya，2024 年，我們的諮詢費用為 4000 萬美元，我們認為這筆費用不會再次發生。正如我們所說的，我們還能夠從 6 月的舉措中節省約 1 億美元的年度成本，其中約 3,500 萬美元將在 2025 年增加。這些成本節省在某種程度上被我們的常規成本結構所抵消。

On page 7, those are pretty wide ranges on purpose because we don't want to pin down what's happening in 2026. We wanted to just try to give the bridge so that you have a sense for what the company looks like post this transaction, and so we're not going to give a lot more detail including the breakdown of cost versus revenue versus interest expense. It was all put in there to try to give you a sense for where we're headed, not try to get into a specific prediction of what's going on over the next 18 months.

第 7 頁故意把範圍設得相當寬，因為我們不想確定 2026 年會發生什麼事。我們只是想嘗試搭建橋樑，讓您了解此次交易後公司的狀況，因此我們不會提供更多細節，包括成本、收入和利息支出的細目分類。所有這些都是為了讓你了解我們的發展方向，而不是試圖對未來 18 個月將發生的事情做出具體的預測。

Okay. Thank you.

好的。謝謝。

Thank you. That concludes our question-and-answer session. And with that, the conference is now concluded. Thank you for attending today's presentation. You may now disconnect.

謝謝。我們的問答環節到此結束。至此，會議結束。感謝您參加今天的演講。您現在可以斷開連線。