AT&T Inc (T) 2020 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the AT&T Third Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) And as a reminder, this conference is being recorded.

女士們、先生們，感謝你們的支持。歡迎參加 AT&T 2020 年第三季財報電話會議。（操作員指示）提醒一下，本次會議正在錄音。

I would now like to turn the conference over to your host, Amir Rozwadowski, Senior Vice President, Finance and Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

現在，我想將會議交給主持人、財務和投資者關係高級副總裁 Amir Rozwadowski。請繼續。

Thank you, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to our third quarter call. I'm Amir Rozwadowski, Head of Investor Relations for AT&T. Joining me on the call today are John Stankey, our CEO; and John Stephens, our Chief Financial Officer.

謝謝大家，早安。歡迎參加我們的第三季電話會議。我是 AT&T 投資人關係主管 Amir Rozwadowski。今天與我一起參加電話會議的還有我們的執行長約翰‧斯坦基 (John Stankey) 和我們的財務長約翰‧史蒂芬斯 (John Stephens)。

Before we begin, I need to call your attention to our safe harbor statement, which says that some of our comments today may be forward-looking. As such, they're subject to risks and uncertainties. Results may differ materially, and additional information is available on the Investor Relations website. And as always, our earnings materials are also available on the Investor Relations page of the AT&T website. I also want to remind you that we are in the quiet period for the FCC spectrum Auction 107, so we cannot address any questions about that today.

在我們開始之前，我需要提請您注意我們的安全港聲明，其中說我們今天的一些評論可能是前瞻性的。因此，它們面臨風險和不確定性。結果可能會有重大差異，更多資訊請參閱投資者關係網站。像往常一樣，我們的收益資料也可在 AT&T 網站的投資者關係頁面上找到。我還想提醒您，我們正處於 FCC 頻譜拍賣 107 的靜默期，因此我們今天無法回答有關該拍賣的任何問題。

With that, I'll turn the call over to John Stankey. John?

說完這些，我將把電話轉給約翰·斯坦基。約翰？

Thanks, Amir, and good morning, everyone. I hope you're all healthy and doing well, and thank you for joining us this morning. John and I are going to keep our comments brief so we can spend more time taking your questions. So let's start with Slide 3.

謝謝，阿米爾，大家早安。我希望你們都身體健康、一切順利，感謝你們今天早上加入我們。約翰和我將簡短地發表評論，以便我們可以花更多時間回答你們的問題。那我們就從投影片 3 開始。

First, our industry-leading network is the driver of our strong wireless customer counts and our healthy broadband and enterprise trends. Our high-quality network underpins our connectivity business and our commitment to customers. Ookla last week ranked AT&T #1 for having the fastest nationwide 5G network. And for the seventh quarter in a row, we won the overall fastest wireless network, and we're named fastest wireless network for iPhones in the third quarter. J.D. Power last month named us tops in customer satisfaction for residential Internet service in every region we offer that service.

首先，我們領先業界的網路是我們強大的無線客戶數量以及健康的寬頻和企業趨勢的驅動力。我們的高品質網路支撐著我們的連結業務和對客戶的承諾。Ookla 上週將 AT&T 評為全國最快的 5G 網路第一名。我們連續第七個季度贏得了整體最快無線網路稱號，並在第三季被評為 iPhone 最快無線網路。上個月，J.D. Power 將我們在提供該服務的每個地區的住宅網路服務客戶滿意度評選中名列前茅。

The Net Promoter Scores we're achieving with our fiber product are materially better than cables and are helping drive increasing penetration rates across our markets. I'm really pleased with the great execution from our AT&T Communications team, led by Jeff McElfresh, under some really challenging circumstances.

我們的光纖產品所獲得的淨推薦值明顯高於電纜，並有助於提高我們整個市場的滲透率。我對 Jeff McElfresh 領導的 AT&T 通訊團隊在極具挑戰性的情況下表現出的出色表現感到非常滿意。

Second, the transformation of our business continues and is on track with how we set this up for you a year ago. The organization has been working to reduce costs, streamline distribution, remove redundancies and simplify processes and support functions. Our focus is supporting added customer value with an improved customer experience. Accordingly, these efficiencies are being plowed back into growth in our market focus areas.

其次，我們的業務轉型仍在繼續，並且按照我們一年前為您設定的計劃進行。該組織一直致力於降低成本、簡化分銷、消除冗餘並簡化流程和支援功能。我們的重點是透過改善客戶體驗來支持增加客戶價值。因此，這些效率將被重新投入到我們市場重點領域的成長中。

And third, we're committed to further strengthening our balance sheet and maintaining our deliberate capital allocation. We've made material progress this year with our debt management while generating solid free cash flow to support our dividend. John will provide more detail, but you're seeing a sharply focused capital structure that is strong, resilient and efficient.

第三，我們致力於進一步加強我們的資產負債表並維持我們審慎的資本配置。今年，我們在債務管理方面取得了實質進展，同時產生了穩健的自由現金流來支持我們的股利。約翰將提供更多細節，但您將看到一個強大、有彈性且高效的、高度集中的資本結構。

We also have a very pragmatic view of the broader economic picture and the COVID-driven challenges we face in some segments, particularly WarnerMedia. In a COVID environment with a tough theatrical business, we made important organizational moves that further position us for growth in direct-to-consumer streaming. Through the pandemic, we continue to invest in HBO Max and continue to grow total HBO and HBO Max subscribers. I'm pleased with how the WarnerMedia team is responding to a challenging environment.

我們也對更廣泛的經濟狀況以及我們在某些領域（尤其是華納媒體）面臨的新冠疫情帶來的挑戰持非常務實的看法。在 COVID 環境下，戲院業務舉步維艱，我們採取了重要的組織舉措，進一步鞏固了我們在直接面向消費者的串流媒體業務中的成長地位。在疫情期間，我們繼續投資 HBO Max，並繼續增加 HBO 和 HBO Max 的總訂閱用戶數量。我對華納媒體團隊應對充滿挑戰的環境的方式感到滿意。

In closing, we recognize that we have more work to do in executing on our vision and earning the loyalty of our customers and investors. I believe this quarter shows we've taken the first few steps in the right direction, but there's more opportunity ahead.

最後，我們認識到，在實現我們的願景和贏得客戶和投資者的忠誠方面，我們還有很多工作要做。我相信本季表明我們已經朝著正確的方向邁出了第一步，但未來還有更多的機會。

With that, I'll turn it over to John to quickly review the details of the quarter.

說完這些，我會把任務交給約翰，讓他快速回顧本季的細節。

Thanks, John, and good morning, everyone. As John said, during the third quarter, we made progress on our business priorities, as you can see in our subscriber gains. Wireless growth was stronger than we've seen in quite some time. We added more than 1 million postpaid subscribers, including 645,000 postpaid phones. We also saw solid growth in AT&T Fiber subscribers with more than 350,000 fiber net adds. And our HBO Max activation base more than doubled in the first full quarter since we launched the business. We now have 38 million U.S. HBO Max and HBO subscribers and 57 million premium subscribers globally.

謝謝，約翰，大家早安。正如約翰所說，在第三季度，我們在業務重點方面取得了進展，您可以從我們的用戶成長中看到這一點。無線業務的成長比我們過去相當長一段時間看到的都要強勁。我們增加了100多萬後付費用戶，其中包括645,000支後付費手機。我們也看到 AT&T 光纖用戶數量穩定成長，新增光纖用戶超過 35 萬戶。自從我們開展業務以來，第一個完整季度我們的 HBO Max 激活基數增加了一倍多。我們目前在美國擁有 3,800 萬 HBO Max 和 HBO 訂閱用戶，在全球擁有 5,700 萬高級訂閱用戶。

Our cost transformation continues on track. We're already seeing savings achieved from benefit efficiencies and organizational alignments. Our focus on refining our distribution is also paying off. We shifted some stores to third-party dealers, closed others, and we've also been able to streamline our customer experience, especially our digital sales and simplify processes.

我們的成本轉型繼續順利進行。我們已經看到透過福利效率和組織調整實現的節約。我們對完善分銷的關注也獲得了回報。我們將一些商店轉移給第三方經銷商，關閉了其他商店，我們還能夠簡化我們的客戶體驗，特別是我們的數位銷售並簡化流程。

We've been very deliberate in managing our debt and focusing on our cash flow. So far this year, we have refinanced more than $60 billion of debt at historically low rates with about $30 billion of debt coming due through 2025. This has lowered our near-term debt maturities, giving us ample financial flexibility in the years ahead. We now expect free cash flow of $26 billion or higher with a full year dividend payout ratio percentage in the high 50s.

我們非常謹慎地管理債務並關注現金流。今年到目前為止，我們已經以歷史最低利率為超過 600 億美元的債務進行了再融資，其中約 300 億美元的債務將於 2025 年到期。這降低了我們的近期債務到期期限，為我們未來幾年提供了充足的財務彈性。我們現在預計自由現金流將達到 260 億美元或更高，全年股息支付率將達到 50% 左右。

Slide 6 illustrates the success we've had this quarter in our market-focused areas. As mentioned, postpaid phone adds were strong. A big factor was postpaid phone churn of 0.69%, our best ever. Prepaid churn was less than 3%, and Cricket churn was even lower than that. Improved postpaid churn was driven by the strength of our network and straightforward pricing plans, including our premium unlimited plan, which includes bundling HBO Max.

投影片 6 展示了我們本季在以市場為重點的領域所取得的成功。如上所述，後付費電話增值業務表現強勁。一個重要因素是後付費電話流失率為 0.69%，這是我們有史以來最好的成績。預付費客戶流失率不到 3%，而 Cricket 的客戶流失率甚至更低。後付費用戶流失率的改善得益於我們強大的網路和簡單的定價計劃，包括我們的高級無限套餐，其中包括捆綁 HBO Max。

Penetration rates for AT&T Fiber are also growing as you can see on the chart on the lower left. We're on track to grow our fiber base by 25% this year, adding 1 million new subscribers.

如左下角的圖表所示，AT&T Fiber 的滲透率也在成長。我們今年的光纖基礎預計將成長 25%，新增 100 萬名用戶。

On the upper-right chart, HBO Max continues to scale. We've overperformed on our initial target of 36 million domestic HBO Max and HBO subscribers for this year. All of this is before we launch our AVOD product in the U.S. next year and before we begin our international deployment of HBO Max, also planned for next year.

在右上角的圖表中，HBO Max 繼續擴大規模。我們超額完成了 HBO Max 和 HBO 今年國內 3,600 萬訂閱用戶的初始目標。所有這些都是在我們明年在美國推出 AVOD 產品以及開始國際部署 HBO Max 之前進行的，HBO Max 也計劃於明年進行國際部署。

As you can see in the premium video chart on the lower right, we continue to make good progress in moving to ratable share losses in our pay TV business, consistent with our share. This is a big step toward what we told you to expect as we exited 2020.

正如您在右下角的優質視訊圖表中所看到的，我們在轉向付費電視業務的可評估份額損失方面繼續取得良好進展，與我們的份額保持一致。這是朝著我們在 2020 年即將結束時所期望的目標邁出的一大步。

We are focused on high-value subscribers as the industry transitions to over-the-top, which has helped improve churn. The introduction of AT&T TV has helped, particularly in our broadband footprint.

隨著產業向 OTT 轉型，我們專注於高價值用戶，這有助於改善客戶流失率。AT&T TV 的推出對我們很有幫助，特別是在我們的寬頻覆蓋方面。

Let's now take a look at our consolidated and segment results, starting with our financial summary on Slide 7. Cash flows continue to be strong even during the pandemic. Cash from operations came in at more than $12 billion, and free cash flow was $8.3 billion.

現在讓我們來看看我們的合併和分部業績，從投影片 7 上的財務摘要開始。即使在大流行期間，現金流仍然保持強勁。經營現金流超過 120 億美元，自由現金流為 83 億美元。

Adjusted EPS was $0.76 per share. That included COVID impacts from incremental costs and lost revenues. Combined, COVID had a $0.21 impact to the third quarter EPS, which we did not adjust for. Adjustments for the quarter included $1.2 billion of debt redemption premiums associated with our debt management activity in the quarter.

調整後的每股收益為 0.76 美元。其中包括 COVID 造成的增量成本和收入損失的影響。總體而言，COVID 對第三季每股收益產生了 0.21 美元的影響，但我們並未對此進行調整。本季的調整包括與我們本季債務管理活動相關的 12 億美元債務贖回溢價。

Revenues were down $2.2 billion from a year ago, including an estimated $2.8 billion of lost or deferred revenue from COVID and foreign exchange pressures. Foreign exchange had a negative impact of about $300 million in revenue, primarily in our Latin America segment.

營收比去年同期下降了 22 億美元，其中包括因新冠疫情和外匯壓力造成的約 28 億美元損失或遞延收入。外匯對收入造成了約 3 億美元的負面影響，主要集中在拉丁美洲地區。

Adjusted operating income was about $8.2 billion, which included the impact of COVID and shift of TV productions in sports to the third quarter. Lower revenues were partly offset by expense reductions. Adjusted operating income margins were down 280 basis points year-over-year but would have been up if you exclude COVID impacts.

調整後的營業收入約為 82 億美元，其中包括 COVID 的影響以及體育電視製作轉移到第三季。收入的減少部分被支出的減少所抵消。調整後的營業利潤率年減 280 個基點，但如果排除 COVID 的影響，利潤率會上升。

And we continue to invest in our growth areas. CapEx was $3.9 billion, and gross capital investment was $4.5 billion, a difference attributed to the timing of vendor payments. And we invested about $600 million in HBO Max in the quarter and are on track with full year estimated investment of $2 billion.

我們將繼續對我們的成長領域進行投資。資本支出為 39 億美元，總資本投資為 45 億美元，差異歸因於供應商付款的時間。本季我們向 HBO Max 投資了約 6 億美元，預計全年投資將達到 20 億美元。

Let's now look at our segment operating results, starting with our Communications segment on Slide 8. Our core businesses continue to show their resiliency. In Mobility, in addition to strong total postpaid and postpaid phone net adds, we saw a strong demand for data connected devices. We had 730,000 total smartphone net adds, both postpaid and prepaid. Prepaid had a solid quarter with 245,000 net adds, with 131,000 of those phones. Bottom line, we're encouraged by our wireless market positioning heading into the fourth quarter, traditionally the busiest season for device upgrades and people moving to unlimited plans. Total wireless revenues were up year-over-year, thanks to growth in equipment revenues.

現在讓我們來看看我們的分部經營業績，從幻燈片 8 上的通訊分部開始。我們的核心業務持續展現出其彈性。在行動領域，除了強勁的後付費和後付費電話網路新增量外，我們還看到了對數據連接設備的強勁需求。我們的智慧型手機淨增用戶總數達到 73 萬部，包括後付費和預付費。預付費用戶本季表現穩健，淨增用戶 24.5 萬人，其中手機用戶 131,000 人。總而言之，我們對進入第四季度的無線市場定位感到鼓舞，傳統上這是設備升級和人們轉向無限流量套餐最繁忙的季節。由於設備收入的成長，無線總收入較去年同期成長。

COVID impacts came from international roaming as well as waived data overages and late payments. Without the roaming impacts alone, service revenues would have had a healthy growth. Roaming also impacted EBITDA margins, which were down slightly even with much higher sales.

COVID 的影響來自國際漫遊以及免除數據超額費用和延遲付款。如果單單沒有漫遊的影響，服務收入就會實現健康成長。漫遊也影響了 EBITDA 利潤率，即使銷售額大幅增加，EBITDA 利潤率仍略有下降。

We're pleased with AT&T Fiber net add momentum. We're on track to add 1 million subscribers this year, and the mix shift to fiber has helped stabilize broadband revenues.

我們對 AT&T Fiber 網路的增加勢頭感到非常滿意。我們今年預計將增加 100 萬用戶，而向光纖的轉變有助於穩定寬頻收入。

Premium video losses were improved sequentially and year-over-year, thanks to lower churn and our focus on high-value customers. The decline is a significant improvement over prior year trends. We continue to drive ARPU growth in both video and IP broadband. In fact, premium video ARPU was up more than 7%. Business Wireline turned in another solid EBITDA quarter. EBITDA was up year-over-year, and margins expanded by 130 basis points despite legacy revenue trends.

由於客戶流失率較低以及我們對高價值客戶的關注，優質影片的損失比上一季和去年同期都有所改善。與去年同期相比，這一下降趨勢有了顯著改善。我們繼續推動視訊和 IP 寬頻的 ARPU 成長。事實上，優質影片的 ARPU 成長了 7% 以上。商業有線又迎來了一個穩健的 EBITDA 季度。儘管營收趨勢存在遺留問題，但 EBITDA 年成長，利潤率擴大了 130 個基點。

Let's move to WarnerMedia and Latin America results, which are on Slide 9. The COVID impact is most evident in our WarnerMedia results. Theatrical and TV production is ramping back up, but theaters remain closed in many parts of the country. Altogether, COVID had an estimated $1.6 billion revenue impact on WarnerMedia in the quarter.

讓我們轉到第 9 張投影片上的華納媒體和拉丁美洲的表現。 COVID 的影響在我們的華納媒體表現中最為明顯。戲劇和電視製作正在恢復，但全國許多地方的劇院仍然關閉。總體而言，COVID 在本季對華納媒體的營收造成了約 16 億美元的影響。

Sports resumed in the quarter, and programming and production costs associated with the shift of sports into the third quarter impacted expenses. At the same time, sports had a favorable impact on advertising revenues.

本季體育賽事恢復，體育賽事轉移到第三季相關的節目製作成本影響了開支。同時，體育運動對廣告收入產生了正面影響。

HBO Max continue to scale nicely driven by strong wholesale activations. We are also pleased with consumer engagement, which is up nearly 60% from what we saw with HBO NOW.

在強勁的批發激活的推動下，HBO Max 繼續保持良好的擴張勢頭。我們也對消費者參與度感到滿意，與 HBO NOW 相比，消費者參與度提高了近 60%。

WarnerMedia's reputation as the industry's highest-quality storyteller was again reinforced, with it leading the industry with 38 Primetime and 15 News and Documentary Emmys. We also saw subscriber turnaround in our Latin America operations. We added more than 400,000 subscribers in Mexico and 200,000 subscribers in Vrio after both showed a COVID slowdown in the second quarter.

華納媒體作為業內最優質故事講述者的聲譽再次得到鞏固，其以 38 項黃金時段艾美獎和 15 項新聞與紀錄片艾美獎領跑業界。我們的拉丁美洲業務的用戶數量也出現好轉。受新冠疫情影響，墨西哥和 Vrio 兩家公司第二季的業務放緩，我們分別在墨西哥和 Vrio 增加了 40 多萬和 20 萬名用戶。

Latin America revenues continue to be challenged by foreign exchange, slow economies and COVID. But even with this, Mexico EBITDA improved year-over-year. And Vrio continues to generate EBITDA and cash flow on a constant currency basis.

拉丁美洲的收入持續受到外匯、經濟放緩和新冠疫情的挑戰。但即便如此，墨西哥的 EBITDA 仍比去年同期有所提升。Vrio 繼續以固定匯率計算產生 EBITDA 和現金流。

Now let's go to Slide 10 for an update on our capital structure. Our cash flows continue to be resilient, even with the pandemic. That allows us to invest in the business and comfortably pay for our dividend while also paying down debt. Free cash flow was $8.3 billion in the quarter and almost $20 billion year-to-date. In fact, we've reduced net debt by more than $30 billion since we closed our Time Warner acquisition a little more than 2 years ago.

現在讓我們翻到第 10 張投影片來了解我們的資本結構的最新情況。即使在疫情期間，我們的現金流仍然保持彈性。這使我們能夠投資於業務並輕鬆支付股息，同時償還債務。本季自由現金流為 83 億美元，年初至今已接近 200 億美元。事實上，自從我們兩年多前完成對時代華納的收購以來，我們的淨債務已經減少了 300 多億美元。

We continue to be active in the debt market. With interest rates at historical lows, we have been aggressive in refinancing our debt maturities and lowering our coupon rates. As you can see on the bottom chart, our near-term debt obligations have changed significantly since the first quarter. We have reduced debt maturities by almost 50% over the next 5 years. This has extended our average debt maturity, which is a good place to be with rates this low. In fact, we have lowered our average interest rate on debt to just under 4.1%, with the lowest coupon rates we've ever seen. That gives us financial flexibility, not just for today but going forward as well.

我們繼續活躍於債務市場。由於利率處於歷史低位，我們積極為債務到期進行再融資並降低票面利率。正如您在下圖中看到的，自第一季以來，我們的近期債務義務發生了顯著變化。我們已將未來五年的債務到期期限減少了近 50%。這延長了我們的平均債務期限，在利率如此低的情況下，這是一個好兆頭。事實上，我們已將債務平均利率降至略低於 4.1%，票面利率達到有史以來的最低水準。這為我們提供了財務靈活性，不僅是現在，而且是未來。

In fact, we ended the quarter with nearly $10 billion in cash on our balance sheet. The $500 billion of assets on our total balance sheet also gives us ample opportunity to continue to strengthen our cash position by monetizing noncore assets. We expect $3 billion of previously announced asset sales to close before the end of the year, including CME, which actually closed last week, and our Puerto Rico wireless properties, which we expect to close by the end of October.

事實上，本季末我們的資產負債表上有近 100 億美元的現金。我們總資產負債表上的 5000 億美元資產也為我們提供了充足的機會，可以透過將非核心資產貨幣化來繼續加強我們的現金狀況。我們預計，先前宣布的價值 30 億美元的資產出售將於年底前完成，其中包括上週實際完成的 CME 資產出售，以及我們預計 10 月底完成的波多黎各無線資產出售。

Amir, that's our presentation. We're now ready for the Q&A.

阿米爾，這就是我們的演示。我們現在準備好進行問答了。

Operator, we're ready to take the first question.

接線員，我們準備好回答第一個問題了。

(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of John Hodulik from UBS.

（操作員指示）您的第一個問題來自瑞銀的 John Hodulik。

Okay. Great. Maybe on the subscriber side, obviously, solid results really across the board and especially in wireless. Is there anything you guys could point to that really drove the gross add improvement that we saw on a year-over-year basis and the better churn? And do you think those results are sustainable?

好的。偉大的。也許在使用者方面，顯然，各方面都取得了穩固的成果，特別是在無線領域。你們能指出什麼真正推動了我們同比增加的總收益和更好的客戶流失率嗎？您認為這些結果能夠持續嗎？

And then also on the fiber side, John, you've talked about repositioning the company around wireless fiber and software entertainment. How should we think about the footprint expansion of your guys' fiber network? I mean obviously, you grew a lot in the -- with the requirements for DIRECTV. But how should we look at that over the next few years?

然後，在光纖方面，約翰，您談到了圍繞無線光纖和軟體娛樂重新定位公司。我們該如何看待你們光纖網路覆蓋範圍的擴展？我的意思是，顯然，您在滿足 DIRECTV 的要求方面已經成長了很多。但在接下來的幾年我們該如何看待這個問題？

So first, on the subscriber side, I think the answer is it's hard work and really good work. This is something that's been in the making for a period of time, where the team has been focused on a variety of different strategies, and I'm not going to point to any one thing. I think we've done a number of things very well, including reengineering our distribution. We have a much broader approach to distribution today and a more effective approach in terms of the efficiency of what it's bringing in. You heard John address some of that in his comments.

因此首先，從使用者角度來看，我認為答案是，這是一項艱苦的工作，而且是一項非常好的工作。這是一項已經籌備了一段時間的工作，團隊一直專注於各種不同的策略，我不會指出任何一件事。我認為我們在很多事情上都做得很好，包括重新設計我們的分銷管道。如今，我們對分銷採取了更為廣泛的方法，並且在效率方面也採取了更有效的方法。您聽到約翰在他的評論中談到了其中的一些問題。

We have been very, very focused on making sure we get value to our right customers, and data has helped us do that. And some of the gain you're seeing is that we're being -- we're able to segment the portions of the market that we think we have issues to address on a value basis and get the right kind of dynamics out to those customers through the right kind of distribution.

我們一直非常注重確保為合適的客戶提供價值，而數據幫助我們做到了這一點。您所看到的部分收益是，我們能夠根據價值細分我們認為有問題的市場部分，並透過正確的分銷方式向這些客戶提供正確的動態。

That's working because we have been very deliberate over the last several years building a much higher-quality network, starting with the FirstNet construct. And that higher-quality network has removed a reason for customers to leave because they're satisfied with the service that they're getting on the network infrastructure.

這是有效的，因為我們在過去幾年裡一直非常刻意地建立一個更高品質的網絡，從 FirstNet 構建開始。而且更高品質的網路也消除了客戶離開的理由，因為他們對在網路基礎設施上獲得的服務感到滿意。

As COVID hit and the wireless networks became much more suburban-oriented than urban-oriented, our strength in low-band spectrum, our literally undisputed strength in volume of low-band spectrum has helped because the suburban experience is oftentimes a more distributed experience. And when you think about penetrating inside buildings, you need low-band spectrum to do that. Mid-band is not going to do that in a suburban environment and nor is millimeter wave, at least not anytime soon until density starts to pick up.

隨著新冠疫情的爆發，無線網路變得更加面向郊區而非城市，我們在低頻段頻譜方面的優勢，我們在低頻段頻譜容量方面無可爭議的優勢，發揮了作用，因為郊區體驗往往是一種更加分散的體驗。當你考慮穿透建築物內部時，你需要低頻頻譜來實現。中頻在郊區環境中不會做到這一點，毫米波也不會，至少在密度開始上升之前不會。

And so we've been very focused on that, and we intend to be very focused on that moving forward. And I would tell you -- I'll just answer it right now because I'm sure somebody is going to ask. Our promotions that are out in the market and what we're doing with the iPhone launch is more of the same.

因此，我們一直非常關注這一點，並且我們打算繼續關注這一領域的發展。我會告訴你——我現在就回答這個問題，因為我確信有人會問。我們在市場上進行的促銷活動和我們在 iPhone 發佈時所做的促銷活動大致上是相同的。

We have an incredibly valuable customer base. It's our most important asset for us to focus on. And when we go in and we look at the data and we understand why that base elects not to stay with us, it's not because of customer service or it's not because they don't like the network. It's because more often than not, they see some enticement to go somewhere else. And that's usually a device offer or a belief that they can't fine-tune their plan to meet their economic construct that they want.

我們擁有極為寶貴的客戶群。這是我們應該關注的最重要的資產。當我們查看數據時，我們明白了為什麼該群體選擇不與我們合作，這並不是因為客戶服務，也不是因為他們不喜歡這個網路。這是因為很多時候，他們都會受到去其他地方的誘惑。這通常是一種設備報價或一種信念，即他們無法調整他們的計劃以滿足他們想要的經濟結構。

And we're now in a position where we can address that. And this offer is going to attack that very point. It's going to ensure that our very best customers, who many have been very loyal to us, these are original iPhone subscribers that have been around a long time, are treated just like a new customer coming into our business. And that they can avail themselves of that opportunity and recommit to us for a very, very long period of time.

現在我們可以解決這個問題了。而這個提議正是針對這一點。這將確保我們最好的客戶（其中許多人一直對我們非常忠誠）受到與新客戶一樣的待遇，這些客戶都是長期使用我們的 iPhone 的原始用戶。他們可以利用這個機會，並在很長一段時間內重新對我們做出承諾。

And while we're getting to talk to them at that moment, we get an opportunity to chat with them about buying up to unlimited plans, and we get an opportunity to move them up the continuum to our higher-value unlimited plans that include entertainment. And so that's a win-win for us in that construct, and it pays off economically.

當我們與他們交談時，我們有機會與他們討論購買無限套餐的事宜，並有機會將他們提升到包含娛樂內容的更高價值的無限套餐。因此，這對我們來說是雙贏的，並且具有經濟效益。

Our base is less committed to contract than our competitors. We know that statistically. And part of this is just simply ensuring that our base is sitting in a similar position to our competitors to make sure that we can continue this record-breaking churn that we've set up. And that's a smart economic decision for us. And it's a smart decision and positioning the brand with our customers. And so when we know we can address the #1 reason why people are leaving us and do it this way, and we get that accretion that comes out of buying up on the unlimited plans, getting them to the sticky entertainment, we think that's the right place for us to be.

與競爭對手相比，我們的基地對合約的承包程度較低。我們從統計上知道這一點。其中一部分只是簡單地確保我們的基礎與競爭對手處於相似的位置，以確保我們能夠繼續保持我們已經設定的破紀錄的流失率。這對我們來說是一個明智的經濟決策。這是一個明智的決定，並根據我們的客戶定位了品牌。因此，當我們知道我們可以解決人們離開我們的首要原因並以這種方式來做時，我們就能從購買無限計劃中獲得收益，讓他們享受粘性娛樂，我們認為這就是我們應該做的事情。

On your second question regarding fiber, my intent is to exit next year in a construct where we are gaining subscribers, gaining share and growing the broadband business. And our footprint will be engineered to allow that to happen.

關於您關於光纖的第二個問題，我打算明年退出，屆時我們將獲得越來越多的用戶，獲得越來越多的市場份額，並發展寬頻業務。我們將設計我們的足跡來實現這一點。

Now we still have a lot of fallow fiber that we can sell into. You saw that this quarter. We're selling into our existing footprint of a little over 14 million fiber homes, and we're doing it very effectively. And you heard my comment about how much customers like the product. And that's one of the reasons we're having great success, and we're going to continue to push in that footprint.

現在我們還有很多休閒纖維可以出售。您在本季就看到了這一點。我們正在向現有的 1400 多萬戶光纖家庭銷售產品，而且我們的銷售工作進展非常順利。您也聽到了我關於顧客多麼喜歡該產品的評論。這是我們取得巨大成功的原因之一，我們將繼續努力。

We've been adding fiber footprint, as we've talked about, slowly. We're going to pick that up a bit so that we can make sure we're in a share gain position, and we're actually growing the broadband business as we exit next year.

正如我們所談到的，我們一直在慢慢增加光纖覆蓋範圍。我們將稍微加快步伐，以確保我們處於市場份額成長的位置，並且我們明年退出時實際上正在發展寬頻業務。

Your next question comes from the line of Phil Cusick from JPMorgan.

您的下一個問題來自摩根大通的 Phil Cusick。

John, can you talk about priorities for next year? It sounds -- and you just said like you want to build more fiber. Does that mean that CapEx needs to be higher? Or can you really source that out of wireless CapEx coming down?

約翰，你能談談明年的重點嗎？聽起來——你剛才說你想建造更多的光纖。這是否意味著資本支出需要更高？或者你真的能從無線資本支出下降中獲得這項收益嗎？

And it's great to see video losses were lower even after we normalize out the pledge customers. What were the drivers of that improvement? And how does DIRECTV fit into the company's plans? Is there anything you can say about these reports of a sale?

很高興看到，即使在我們規範了承諾客戶之後，影片損失仍然較低。推動這項改善的因素是什麼？DIRECTV 在公司的計畫中扮演著怎樣的角色？對於這些銷售報告您有什麼要說的嗎？

So Phil, we're not giving our guidance on capital for next year at this point. I will tell you that we feel comfortable that we can manage the cash flow equation effectively and do what I just said. I'm not concerned about that part of it. We'll come out a little bit later this year, and we'll give you the guidance and lay out those numbers for you.

所以菲爾，我們目前還不能給出明年資本的指引。我會告訴你，我們感到很舒服，我們可以有效地管理現金流方程式，並做到我剛才所說的。我並不關心那部分。我們將在今年稍後公佈這項數據，並為您提供指導和數據。

But I feel really comfortable, if you kind of look at what's going on, and these customer counts certainly help. I think you're aware, we're working really hard on the cost equation around here, and that's helping us invest in some of the work we're doing in the markets.

但我感到非常放心，如果你看看正在發生的事情，這些客戶數量肯定會有所幫助。我想您知道，我們正在努力解決成本問題，這有助於我們投資於我們在市場上所做的一些工作。

We have a very different build in front of us than we've traditionally had. I think if you think about what we've historically been doing on the fiber side, we've had to light up new central offices, kind of new geographic areas, which tends to be a little bit more expensive. We have an opportunity to do some really economic fill in and shorten the cycle from investment to cash that we can factor in on this.

我們面前的建構與傳統的建構截然不同。我認為，如果你想想我們過去在光纖方面所做的事情，我們必須照亮新的中心局，新的地理區域，這往往會更昂貴一些。我們有機會做一些真正經濟的填補，並縮短從投資到現金的周期，我們可以將這一點考慮在內。

And so we'll give you some direction next year, but I don't think you're going to see an appreciable change in our trajectory as we go through this. And we'll fill in the blanks for you coming forward here.

因此，明年我們會給你一些指導，但我認為你不會看到我們的軌跡有明顯的變化。我們將在這裡為您填補這些空白。

On the video side, we've been focused on high-value customers. And so some of this, what you're seeing is when we made the shift to kind of get out of the promotional dynamic, and frankly, others in the industry got out of a promotional dynamic where the VMPDs decided to go to a first price that's a little bit more reflective of their cost structure. That normalized a lot of things. We had to work through that for a couple of quarters because it definitely impacts gross. But the gross that we're taking in right now are effective customers, the ones we can make money on, and they're ones that are not just churning back and forth. And we think that's a much better mix, and you're starting to see us work through that cycle a little bit.

在影片方面，我們一直專注於高價值客戶。因此，您所看到的是，當我們做出轉變以擺脫促銷動態時，坦白說，業內其他人也擺脫了促銷動態，VMPD 決定採用更能反映其成本結構的初始價格。這使得很多事情變得正常化。我們必須花幾個季度的時間來解決這個問題，因為它肯定會影響總收入。但我們現在獲得的總收入是有效客戶，是我們可以賺錢的客戶，而且他們不是來來往往的客戶。我們認為這是一個更好的組合，而且你開始看到我們一點一點地完成這個週期。

But look, I want to give a lot of credit to the team. As we've been clear on what our direction is, they're focused on ensuring that we run the business the right way, and we've been a lot better at retention.

但是你看，我想給這個團隊很多榮譽。由於我們明確了自己的方向，他們專注於確保我們以正確的方式開展業務，並且我們在保留客戶方面做得更好。

We have a better product in the market right now for those people that we can pair with broadband. The AT&T TV product is a much more natural fit in terms of how customers want to use a pay TV service today than the satellite product is. And when we compare it with broadband, which as you see, we've got improved volumes on broadband, that helps our video business.

對於那些可以與寬頻配對的人來說，我們現在在市場上有更好的產品。就現今客戶使用付費電視服務的方式而言，AT&T 電視產品比衛星產品更適合。當我們將其與寬頻進行比較時，如您所見，我們的寬頻流量有所提高，這有助於我們的視訊業務。

And so as we continue that momentum and we think about what we can do in the next year, that can help the video business as well. I'm not going to suggest to you that it's anything but a mature business. It's going to continue some degree of decline, but we told you we'd like to exit this year with our decline rate looking more ratable to our share. And we're on that march to do that.

因此，當我們保持這種勢頭並思考明年我們可以做些什麼時，這也可以幫助視訊業務。我不會向你暗示這不是一個成熟的業務。它還會繼續一定程度的下降，但我們告訴過你們，我們希望今年的下降率對我們的份額來說更合適。我們正朝著這個目標前進。

We're doing it by some tried-and-true approaches to how we should manage the base, how we should manage our customers, what kind of service we should give them. And the team has done a really nice job of kind of getting back to basics on that and doing the right things around it. And the final question, I'm not going to comment on any speculation at this point.

我們正在透過一些經過實踐檢驗的方法來實現這一目標，即如何管理基地、如何管理客戶、為他們提供什麼樣的服務。團隊在回歸基礎並採取正確行動方面做得非常出色。最後一個問題，我現在不會對任何猜測發表評論。

Your next question comes from the line of Simon Flannery from Morgan Stanley.

您的下一個問題來自摩根士丹利的西蒙·弗蘭納裡。

Right on Warner, I wonder if you could just help us think about how things are progressing on the theatrical -- the production for TV and movies. And how you're thinking about that evolving? And any big changes you might have there in terms of how we should think about the future post-COVID?

就華納而言，我想知道您是否可以幫助我們思考戲劇、電視和電影製作的進展。您認為這項發展將如何發展？關於我們該如何看待後疫情時代的未來，您可能會做出哪些重大改變？

And then a capital allocation question. I think, John, you talked about the importance of the dividend and the track record of dividend growth. But it looks like you're not really getting paid for the dividend in the current market. How do you balance that versus, say, buybacks? Obviously, you've got spectrum auctions coming up, but leverage, deleveraging, you've addressed a lot of the near-term maturity. So love to think about the priorities and how you think about order of preference there.

然後是資本配置問題。約翰，我認為你談到了股息的重要性以及股息成長的記錄。但看起來在當前市場上你並沒有真正獲得股息回報。您如何平衡這一點與回購呢？顯然，頻譜拍賣即將到來，但槓桿、去槓桿等許多近期到期問題已經解決。所以喜歡思考優先事項以及您如何考慮那裡的優先順序。

So on the Warner side, the -- I'm breathing easier. I think everybody's breathing easier. That's probably a bad analogy in the COVID environment. Feel much better about the restart of production. We exited -- to kind of give you a rough idea, probably about 180 productions of some way, shape or form were underway at February before the pandemic hit. And I would tell you roughly, probably -- I haven't looked at the numbers in the last week or so, but I think we had about 130 productions up and running in some shape or form last week.

因此，從華納方面來說，我可以鬆一口氣了。我想每個人都能輕鬆一點。在 COVID 環境下，這可能是一個糟糕的類比。對重新開始生產感覺好多了。我們退出了——給你一個大概的了解，在疫情爆發之前的 2 月份，大概有 180 部以某種形式製作的作品正在進行中。我大概可以告訴你——我沒有看過過去一周左右的數字，但我認為上週我們以某種形式啟動並運行了大約 130 部作品。

So we're well back into that ramp back up. I don't think we have to get back to 180, by the way. We've -- there's some stuff we rationalized. But we're starting to figure out how to do this. We clearly have gotten through most of the hurdles from a civic perspective where the geographies that we operate and produce in are working with us on what the constructs are. And there's no barriers to actually having the work perform.

因此，我們已完全回到原來的狀態。順便說一句，我認為我們不必回到 180。我們——我們已經將一些事情合理化了。但我們開始想辦法做到這一點。從公民的角度來看，我們顯然已經克服了大部分障礙，我們經營和生產的地區正在與我們合作建構這些結構。並且實際上沒有任何障礙可以阻礙工作的完成。

I think we've got the right guilds and unions squared away. We built in the right processes around testing. We're far enough into and far enough along with work that's going on, where the confidence level of employees is growing day-by-day that we can, in fact, protect the safety of individuals and still get work done.

我認為我們已經找到了合適的行會和工會。我們圍繞測試建立了正確的流程。我們已經在工作中投入了足夠的時間和精力，員工的信心水平正在日益增強，事實上，我們可以在保護個人安全的同時完成工作。

So feel good about where that's at. I think we're out of the woods at this point from being dead cold in the middle of the pandemic to one where we feel like we can get hours produced and brought forward. And that's going to help our products. I mean it's -- most importantly, it's going to help HBO Max.

因此，對此感到滿意。我認為，我們現在已經走出了困境，不再處於疫情中的冰冷狀態，而是感覺可以提前生產和安排時間了。這對我們的產品有幫助。我的意思是——最重要的是，它將幫助 HBO Max。

Theatrical work is underway as well. We're doing the work for theatrical production. The question is, what does exhibition look like? And that's still kind of one of these things we don't have great visibility on.

戲劇工作也正在進行中。我們正在從事戲劇製作工作。問題是，展覽是什麼樣子的？這仍然是我們不太了解的事情之一。

If we -- we've done some experimentation. We've tried a few things. I can't tell you that we walked away from the Tenet experience saying it was a home run. I'm happy we did it. I think the team was incredibly creative. I think we learned a couple things about what we can do. I actually believe that if theaters were open nationwide, if California and New York were open, we have some latitude to be able to do some of these geographic-specific releases and work through that. So maybe as we get to a place where there's a little bit more consistent footprint, we can do some more.

如果我們——我們已經做了一些實驗。我們嘗試了一些方法。我無法告訴你，我們從 Tenet 體驗中走出來並說這是一次本壘打。我很高興我們做到了。我認為這個團隊非常有創意。我認為我們了解了一些關於我們能做什麼的事情。我確實相信，如果全國各地的劇院都開放，如果加州和紐約州都開放，我們就有一定的自由度來製作一些針對特定地區的影片並完成這項工作。因此，也許當我們到達一個有更一致足跡的地方時，我們可以做更多的事情。

I'd say the holiday season is going to be the next big checkpoint to see what occurs and whether or not we can actually move some content back into theatrical exhibition. And we're going to have to maybe make a game-time decision on that based on what's happening in different geographies and what's happening effectively with infection counts in the country. We're still committed to want to try to put some of the content that we think is the most important into a theatrical channel, if that makes sense.

我想說假期將是下一個重要的檢查點，看看會發生什麼，以及我們是否真的可以將一些內容重新移回戲劇展覽。我們可能需要根據不同地區的情況以及全國感染人數的實際情況，在比賽時間做出決定。如果有意義的話，我們仍然致力於嘗試將我們認為最重要的一些內容放入影院頻道。

Now at the same time, we're expecting this to be incredibly choppy moving into next year, and guidance and direction we're giving you with the business takes that into account. We're not optimistic. We're not looking that we're seeing -- expecting a huge recovery in theatrical moving into the early part of next year. We're expecting it to continue to be choppy.

同時，我們預計明年的情況將異常動盪，我們為您的業務提供的指導和方向已考慮到這一點。我們並不樂觀。我們並沒有期待看到戲院票房在明年年初出現大幅復甦。我們預計情況將繼續動盪。

And as a result of that, we're having to evaluate all of our options and keeping them open. And the teams kind of work in the A plan, the B plan and the C plan. And as we get through the next month or 2 and we look at what's occurring, we'll call the cards on the A plan and the B plan and the C plan and kind of come back to you. So that's kind of the best I can give you on where we are in restarting that.

因此，我們必須評估所有選擇並保持開放。團隊依照 A 計畫、B 計畫和 C 計畫進行工作。當我們度過接下來的一兩個月並觀察正在發生的情況時，我們會調用 A 計劃、B 計劃和 C 計劃中的卡片，然後將其反饋給您。這就是我能告訴你的關於我們重新開始這項工作的進展的最佳資訊。

The other thing that I would tell you that we have a little bit of lack of visibility on is if you think about the broader media business is what happens with the sports calendar in '21. Clearly, we've seen the leagues demonstrate that they can, in fact, put games on, and they can carry them through.

我想告訴你的另一件事是，我們有點缺乏了解，如果你考慮更廣泛的媒體業務，你會知道 21 年的體育日程會發生什麼。顯然，我們已經看到聯盟證明他們確實可以舉辦比賽，並且可以完成比賽。

The timing of those and how many there are and exactly what transpires in '21 and where it falls in the calendar is still a little bit uncertain. And until we have a little better visibility on that, it's hard to give you exact views of what first, second, third, fourth quarter looks like next year. And I think in the coming weeks, we'll probably get a little bit more clarity around that and be able to adjust the plans accordingly. And we've demonstrated that we can, in fact, do the right things around producing those safely and selling advertising into them. We just need to kind of see where the schedules shape out.

這些活動的時間、數量、21 年究竟會發生什麼以及在日曆上的位置仍然有點不確定。在我們對此有更清晰的了解之前，很難準確預測明年第一、第二、第三和第四季的情況。我認為在接下來的幾週內，我們可能會對此有更清晰的了解，並能夠相應地調整計劃。我們已經證明，我們確實可以正確地進行生產，確保其安全，並在其中投放廣告。我們只是需要看看時間表如何安排。

On the capital allocation question, I think the way you get paid is you probably execute consistently. And so I'm well aware that right now, there's definitely a discontinuity in the yield versus what we're paying, and I don't like that. I'm sure nobody else out there who owns the stock likes it. And I think the best way for us to kind of address that is make sure that each quarter, we're delivering on what we tell you we're going to do and doing it consistently. And ultimately, I think that problem probably takes care of itself.

關於資本配置問題，我認為你獲得報酬的方式可能是你持續執行。因此，我很清楚，現在的收益與我們所支付的金額之間肯定存在不連續性，我不喜歡這種情況。我確信沒有其他持有該股票的人會喜歡它。我認為解決這個問題的最佳方法是確保每個季度我們都履行我們所說的要做的事情並始終如一地去做。最終，我認為這個問題可能會自行解決。

But your point is a valid one in the meantime to ask about how we should think about things. And where I've been and where I still sit is I think when we have visibility getting through the COVID cycle, we can make those decisions on capital allocation. I think it's important that we can continue to manage the debt load down, and that's our first priority, to ensure that it isn't the discussion every time we sit down around where this business is at.

但同時，你關於我們應該如何思考問題的觀點也是正確的。我一直以來以及現在的觀點是，當我們能夠清晰地了解 COVID 週期時，我們就可以就資本配置做出決定。我認為，重要的是我們能夠繼續管理債務負擔，這是我們的首要任務，以確保我們每次坐下來討論業務現狀時，不會都討論債務負擔。

We feel comfortable, as John indicated, that we've restructured it in a way that makes sense, that we can manage this business and do the things we need to do to invest in growth. It's given us the space to do that and make sure that we can, in a very disciplined fashion, pay it down. As we get through that, and we have your confidence in that regard, and then we'll start looking at whether or not it makes sense for us to do something different on the equity side.

正如約翰所指出的，我們感到很舒服，我們已經以合理的方式對其進行了重組，我們可以管理這項業務，並做我們需要做的事情來投資成長。它為我們提供了這樣做的空間，並確保我們能夠以非常自律的方式償還債務。當我們解決了這個問題，而我們對此有信心時，我們就會開始考慮在股權方面採取一些不同的做法是否合理。

I'd like to get some of this choppiness of COVID out of the way before we kind of move back into that cycle, so that we can all be confident around what we think from an economic outlook perspective that we're managing into. I have no question we can manage through this cycle and keep the equation in check. I'm really confident of that.

在我們重新進入這個週期之前，我想先消除一些 COVID 帶來的波動，這樣我們就能從經濟前景的角度對我們正在應對的情況充滿信心。我毫不懷疑我們可以度過這個週期並控制好這個平衡。我對此非常有信心。

When we get to kind of that discretionary capital allocation piece will be when I'm a little bit more comfortable that we know what the game plan is for the '21 time frame. And I think we're getting a little bit closer to being able to make that call. John, do you want to add anything on that?

當我們談到那種可自由支配的資本配置時，我會更加放心，因為我們知道 21 世紀時間框架的遊戲計劃是什麼。我認為我們距離做出這項決定已經越來越近了。約翰，你還有什麼要補充的嗎？

No. Simon, we've got the balance sheet, the debt towers, the debt maturities in really good shape. A lot of flexibility, not only over the near term as we spelled out on the slides, but quite frankly, over the long term. So we feel very good about that. The bond market has responded very well to it. We'll continue to reduce our debt levels. But we've got a lot of flexibility going forward. And so feel good about that.

不。西蒙，我們的資產負債表、債務狀況和債務到期情況都非常好。很大的靈活性，不僅在短期內（正如我們在幻燈片上所闡述的），而且坦率地說，在長期內也是如此。因此我們對此感到非常高興。債券市場對此反應良好。我們將繼續降低債務水平。但我們在未來仍擁有很大的靈活性。所以對此感到高興。

The one thing I'd say is this all starts with a cash flow number and the resiliency of our products and services and the resiliency of our customers. And they continue to pay us on a timely basis for our services. This is really, really important. That's the core of it when John talked about, when he's talking about low churn, and it gives us a basis for all of this. So we feel very good about where we're going.

我想說的是，這一切都始於現金流數字、我們的產品和服務的彈性以及我們客戶的彈性。他們繼續按時支付我們的服務費用。這真的非常重要。這就是約翰談到的低客戶流失率的核心，它為我們提供了所有這些的基礎。因此，我們對於未來的發展方向感到非常滿意。

Your next question comes from the line of David Barden from Bank of America.

您的下一個問題來自美國銀行的 David Barden。

So I guess, John Stephens, I guess this question is related to the guidance. So a couple of questions around it. So at the beginning of the year, the math of kind of a low 60% dividend payout ratio was cash flows in the kind of $23 billion to $25 billion range. Now it's north of $26 billion. And so can we talk about some of the drivers of that?

所以我想，約翰史蒂芬斯，我想這個問題與指導有關。圍繞此我有幾個問題。因此，在年初，60% 的低股息支付率的計算結果是現金流在 230 億美元至 250 億美元之間。現在已超過 260 億美元。那我們可以討論一下其中的一些驅動因素嗎？

What part of that is related to lower CapEx as a function of vendor financing? What are the cash tax expectations that go into that? And what are the working capital expectations related to the iPhone promotions that John Stankey was talking about earlier, kind of affecting that number and kind of the exit trajectory into next year?

其中哪些部分與供應商融資導致的較低資本支出有關？其中的現金稅預期是多少？那麼，約翰史坦基之前談到的與 iPhone 促銷相關的營運資本預期是什麼？這會影響到這個數字以及明年的退出軌跡嗎？

And then I guess you're particularly qualified to answer the other question, which is which we're getting a lot, which is if there's a Dem sweep and the Biden tax proposal goes through, what does that mean for AT&T, who is one of the biggest beneficiaries of tax reform under the current administration. How could that change the cash flow outlook for AT&T?

然後我想你特別有資格回答另一個問題，也就是我們經常問到的問題，那就是如果民主黨大獲全勝並且拜登的稅收提案獲得通過，這對 AT&T 意味著什麼，它是現任政府稅收改革的最大受益者之一。這會如何改變 AT&T 的現金流前景？

Yes. So first thing, David, let me go back on the cash flow side. It really does start with our customers. And when we came out with our guidance for the year, there was uncertainty and lack of visibility with regard to COVID, so we were careful and prudent with that.

是的。那麼首先，大衛，讓我回到現金流方面。它確實從我們的客戶開始。當我們發布年度指引時，由於新冠疫情存在不確定性和缺乏可預見性，因此我們對此非常謹慎。

It turns out, our -- and you can see it in the third quarter balance sheet, you can see it in the third quarter results. Our collection rates have been very good. Customers, the resiliency of the products, the appreciation for the service, we're getting paid on a timely basis and at very good levels. And so that's the first point.

事實證明，您可以在第三季的資產負債表中看到它，也可以在第三季的業績中看到它。我們的收集率一直都很好。客戶、產品的彈性、對服務的讚賞，我們都及時獲得了非常好的報酬。這是第一點。

The second point is, across the board, there's been working capital efforts, whether it's managing receivables, then managing payables, whether it's tax payments, that all has been done. Some of that came out of the CARES Act with the benefits of, for example, deferring payroll tax payments or deferring income tax payments that were allowed by the CARES Act. All of that's been taken into account.

第二點是，我們全面進行了營運資本工作，無論是管理應收帳款、管理應付帳款，或是納稅，這些都已完成。其中一些措施來自《關懷法案》，其好處包括，例如，推遲繳納工資稅或推遲繳納所得稅，這些都是《關懷法案》允許的。所有這些都已被考慮在內。

I think we have a history of being very focused on working capital and focus on cash flow. When we come back to it, though, the resiliency of the products and services, the growth in mobility, the growth in fiber, the strong performance of HBO Max is all leading us to a better revenue stream situation such that we feel really comfortable about going to that $26 billion or better number.

我認為我們一貫非常注重營運資金和現金流。然而，當我們回顧這一點時，產品和服務的彈性、移動性的成長、光纖的成長、HBO Max 的強勁表現，都使我們的收入流狀況更好，因此我們對達到 260 億美元或更高的數字感到非常放心。

Now there's still uncertainty. And so there's not a specific number we can pay. And quite frankly, we'll see how sales go and the working capital impacts of the iPhone launch. Feel real good about that. But that's the basis from where we came up to it. All the pieces you mentioned are a part of that. You can look at the disclosures in the -- for the third quarter and the 10-Q to kind of get some of the specifics that you're asking about. Wait until those are out. But those are all taking it into account.

現在仍然存在不確定性。因此我們無法確定可以支付的具體金額。坦白說，我們將關注 iPhone 的銷售情況以及其對營運資金的影響。對此感覺非常好。但這就是我們得出這結論的基礎。您提到的所有部分都是其中的一部分。您可以查看第三季和 10-Q 中的披露信息，以了解您所詢問的一些具體信息。等到它們出來。但這些都是考慮到這一點的。

Feel good about dividend payout ratio in that 50s, high 50s rate. And quite frankly, in a pandemic year, that's pretty remarkable. It's really as good as it's been in probably 5 or 6 years. So it's really a sign of a strong balance sheet and a strong business.

對 50 年代的股息支付率感到滿意，50 年代的股息支付率很高。坦白說，在疫情肆虐的年份，這是相當了不起的。它確實和過去 5 或 6 年一樣好。所以這確實是強勁資產負債表和強勁業務的標誌。

On tax reform, quite frankly, the rate issue is obvious, and it's the increase in the rates could cause tax payments go up. It's also a little, quite frankly, the impact on bonus depreciation, the incentive for CapEx. We are certainly one of the larger, if not the largest capital investor in the United States that generates a ton of jobs for our employees as well as for our suppliers' employees. So we're watching that carefully. That's probably a significant issue for the overall economy as well as for any individual company's tax treatment.

關於稅制改革，坦白說，稅率問題是顯而易見的，稅率的提高可能會導致稅收增加。坦白說，這也對獎金折舊、資本支出的激勵有一點影響。我們無疑是美國最大的資本投資者之一，為我們的員工以及供應商的員工創造了大量的就業機會。因此我們正在密切關注此事。這對於整體經濟以及任何個別公司的稅收待遇來說可能都是一個重大問題。

Likewise, if you look at it over the last 20 years, that's been supported by both parties, whether it be Democratic or Republican, this incentive to invest. So we'll continue to follow it, and we'll continue to follow the, quite frankly, the infrastructure reforms and whether they decide to include any of the broadband activity in there and whether we can -- that would fit within our efforts to expand our fiber base and expand our footprint. Thank you, David.

同樣，如果你回顧過去 20 年，你會發現這種投資激勵措施得到了民主黨和共和黨兩黨的支持。因此，我們將繼續關注它，坦率地說，我們將繼續關注基礎設施改革，以及他們是否決定將任何寬頻活動納入其中，以及我們是否可以 - 這符合我們擴大光纖基礎和擴大覆蓋範圍的努力。謝謝你，大衛。

Your next question comes from the line of Brett Feldman from Goldman Sachs.

您的下一個問題來自高盛的布雷特·費爾德曼。

I'm actually going to follow up on something that John was just sort of alluding to. Because you talked earlier about the opportunity to drive higher penetration of the 14 million homes passed with fiber that you have already. But this might be a slightly outdated statistic, but I think there's something like 60 million customer locations in your landline region. So you're maybe only passing 25% of them today with fiber, which would imply you could meaningfully expand the availability of your fiber product in your addressable market if you were to sort of step on the gas there.

我實際上要跟進約翰剛才提到的一些事情。因為您之前談到提高已覆蓋 1400 萬戶光纖家庭的普及率的機會。但這可能是一個稍微過時的統計數據，但我認為您的固定電話區域大約有 6000 萬個客戶位置。因此，今天您可能只透過光纖滿足了其中 25% 的需求，這意味著如果您加大力度，您可以顯著擴大光纖產品在目標市場的供應。

So what are the conditions that would encourage you to meaningfully expand that fiber footprint? Does it have to be something on the policy side? Or are there operating items you have greater control over such that you'd be willing to meaningfully increase the fiber-related CapEx?

那麼，什麼樣的條件會鼓勵您有意義地擴大光纖覆蓋範圍呢？這是否必須是政策方面的事？或者，您是否對某些營運項目有更大的控制權，以至於您願意大幅增加與光纖相關的資本支出？

Brett, it's a good question. Thank you. I would tell you this. Obviously, the policy in the country where it stands right now is attractive for investment in infrastructure and attractive for investment in fiber. And we think we've had the right kind of formula around that. And I would expect that if there is a new administration, there may be a lens put on that. They may want to put their pen to how they want to tweak it. And certainly, there's some broader things that need to be done in this country. Addressing some of the more hard-to-serve areas and the digital divide dynamics that make that a worthwhile thing for people to have discussion on.

布雷特，這是個好問題。謝謝。我會告訴你這個。顯然，該國目前的政策對基礎設施投資和光纖投資都有吸引力。我們認為我們已經有了正確的解決方案。我希望如果有新政府上台，可能會對此進行關注。他們可能想用筆來隨意調整它。當然，這個國家還需要做一些更廣泛的事情。解決一些難以服務的領域和數位落差動態，使其成為值得人們討論的事情。

I would tell you, I don't think we need policy to get better. We just need to ensure that the policy doesn't whipsaw back to some place that is inconsistent with incenting investment and infrastructure. Because I believe, right now, there is, to your point, a large incentive for people to go and continue to put money into infrastructure investment. And we would be one of those to do that.

我想告訴你，我認為我們不需要政策來變得更好。我們只需要確保政策不會突然回到與激勵投資和基礎設施不一致的地方。因為我相信，正如您所說，現在人們有很大的動力去繼續向基礎設施投資投入資金。而我們將會成為這樣做的人之一。

I think good things come from that when we do it. We employ a lot of very meaningful middle-class jobs that pay people well. They come with benefits that allow them to do great things in their lives and better their families' lives. And I think everybody, from a policy perspective, would look at that and say, that's the exact kind of jobs we want. They're the ones that are good for this economy and good for people and have all the characteristics that nobody debates. We want to see the American worker experience.

我認為當我們這樣做時就會產生好的結果。我們為中產階級提供了大量非常有意義的工作，而且薪資很高。他們享有的福利使他們能夠在生活中做出偉大的事情並改善家人的生活。我認為，從政策角度來看，每個人都會認為這正是我們想要的工作。它們對經濟、對人民都有好處，並且具有無人爭議的所有特徵。我們想看看美國工人的經驗。

What I would say from a perspective of step on the gas and what we are working on internally and what I've had the team focused on is our company is in a very unique position of anybody that we compete with in our competitive set. We serve everybody from the smallest residential customer up to the largest corporation and everything in between. And we run, to your point, Brett, one of the largest footprints that still has customers that want to connect to the network on a fixed basis. And so we should be in a very unique position for every trench foot of fiber that we put in the ground of putting more traffic on that fiber and monetizing it more effectively than anybody else, given the breadth of the customer base that we serve and the footprint that we serve, the retail mix that we have as well as the very robust, fixed wholesale mix that we have in serving others' infrastructure.

從加大油門、我們內部正在進行的工作以及我讓團隊關注的重點來看，我想說的是，我們公司在競爭中處於非常獨特的地位，與任何競爭對手相比都處於非常獨特的地位。我們為所有人提供服務，從最小的住宅客戶到最大的公司，以及介於兩者之間的一切客戶。正如布雷特所說，我們的網路是最大的網路之一，仍然有客戶希望以固定方式連接到網路。因此，考慮到我們服務的客戶群的廣度和服務的覆蓋範圍、我們擁有的零售組合以及我們在服務其他基礎設施時擁有的非常強大、固定的批發組合，我們應該對我們鋪設的每一條光纖都處於非常獨特的地位，我們可以為這些光纖帶來更多的流量，並比任何其他人更有效地將其貨幣化。

And my belief -- not my belief. I know that as a company, we probably have not squeezed the lemon out of that juice quite enough. And what I am trying to drive this business forward on is getting much more artful in our engineering to ensure that every trench foot of fiber that we're putting in, we are serving every segment we can serve as effectively as we can, and we're not looking at our investment on a customer segment by customer segment basis, but we're looking at it as a trench foot of fiber that we put in that has a bunch of different access technologies that hang off the end of it. Sometimes it happens to be a millimeter wave site. Sometimes, it happens to be a big cell tower with 4 occupants on it that we sell wholesale into. Sometimes it happens to be a strip mall, where some of those customers want to be served with a fixed connection, and some can get by with simply having a credit card reader attached to a wireless network. And sometimes it's a single-family household.

我的信仰－不是我的信仰。我知道，作為一家公司，我們可能還沒有充分發揮潛力。我試圖推動這項業務向前發展的是，讓我們的工程設計變得更加巧妙，以確保我們鋪設的每一英尺光纖都能盡可能有效地服務於我們所能服務的每一個細分市場，我們不是根據每個客戶細分市場來考慮我們的投資，而是將其視為鋪設的每一英尺光纖，其末端都懸掛著各種不同的接入技術。有時它恰好是一個毫米波站點。有時，我們恰好向一座有 4 名用戶的大信號塔批發產品。有時它恰好是一個商業街，其中一些顧客希望透過固定連線獲得服務，而有些顧客只需將信用卡讀卡機連接到無線網路即可。有時是單戶住宅。

But we can be the best at doing that. And when I am confident that we are actually engineering and executing in that fashion, I will step on the gas with a way that I think everybody will look at it and say, those returns are so darn good. Why wouldn't you do that?

但我們可以做到最好。當我確信我們確實以這種方式進行設計和執行時，我會加大力度，我認為每個人都會看到並說，這些回報真是太好了。為什麼不這麼做呢？

We've done really well on our investments thus far. Our consumer broadband business is a good business. Our wholesale infrastructure business is a good business. Our private network business that goes to the enterprise customers is a good business. But we're at this moment where fiber is the juice behind every single network that serve this notion of wireless versus fixed is blurring more and more. The millimeter wave dynamic will drive to the integrated fiber network, and we should be the leader in that space. And when I'm confident that we're engineering and operating that way, then I will be very, very robust in how I think about funding our business to do that.

到目前為止，我們的投資表現非常好。我們的消費者寬頻業務是一項很好的業務。我們的批發基礎設施業務是一項很好的業務。我們面向企業客戶的專網業務是一項很好的業務。但目前，光纖是每個網路背後的支柱，無線與固定之間的界線越來越模糊。毫米波動態將推動綜合光纖網路的發展，我們應該成為該領域的領導者。當我確信我們能夠以這種方式進行設計和營運時，我會非常堅定地考慮如何為我們的業務提供資金來實現這一目標。

Your next question comes from the line of Kannan Venkateshwar from Barclays.

您的下一個問題來自巴克萊銀行的 Kannan Venkateshwar。

A couple if I could then. Firstly, I mean, when you think about the fiber business, I guess the growth at Verizon yesterday, growth that you guys reported today, and then we also have some forward-looking guidance from the cable companies, which also demonstrates strong growth today. When we look at the overall broadband market, the penetration rates don't have a lot of room to grow overall across the entire market, but everybody is growing really fast.

如果可以的話，我會選一對。首先，我的意思是，當你考慮光纖業務時，我想昨天 Verizon 的增長，你們今天報告的增長，然後我們還從有線電視公司獲得了一些前瞻性的指導，這也表明今天的強勁增長。當我們觀察整個寬頻市場時，我們會發現整個市場的普及率並沒有太大的成長空間，但每個市場都在快速成長。

So I guess could you give us some color in terms of what the growth source is if it's not coming from others in the industry? Is it things like people moving into vacation homes or a different level of occupancy? So if you could give us some color on the growth sources, that would be very helpful, and of course, the sustainability on the back of that.

所以我想您能否跟我們講講，如果成長來源不是來自產業內的其他公司，那麼成長來源是什麼？是人們搬進度假屋或入住率不同之類的事情嗎？因此，如果您能向我們介紹成長來源，那將會非常有幫助，當然還有背後的永續性。

And secondly, I guess -- and the NFL is in the midst of negotiating all their rights. Could you give us some sense of what your priorities are with respect to sports rights and how you view that going forward?

其次，我想——NFL 正在就其所有權利進行談判。您能否告訴我們，您在體育權利方面的優先事項是什麼，以及您對未來有何看法？

Hey, Kannan. So look, first and foremost, we are a share taker, and that's where a lot of our growth comes from. I think we've characterized for you that when we are 36 months into penetration on the fiber infrastructure we put in place, we move nearly 10 share points. And that's -- we don't do that often in a product. And that's one of the reasons why I think if we're smart about how we deploy more fiber and do it the right way, we think there's a strong economic equation here.

嘿，Kannan。所以，首先，我們是市場佔有率的獲取者，而我們的成長很大一部分來自於此。我想我們已經向您描述過，當我們在光纖基礎設施上實施 36 個月的滲透率時，我們的市場份額上升了近 10 個百分點。那是——我們在產品中並不經常這樣做。這就是為什麼我認為如果我們明智地部署更多光纖並以正確的方式進行，我們認為這裡存在一個強大的經濟方程式。

And when you have a product that's perceived as being a better product from the customer base, and I shared that with you in my opening comments about what our Net Promoter Score metrics are for our subscriber base, that's a good place to be. That's what helps it. And certainly, one of the dynamics that has helped the performance and the perception of our products in the COVID environment is we all sat around for a number of years talking about what is the killer app that drove upstream demand. Because we knew the Achilles heel of certain networks that have been built was restricted upstream bandwidth.

當你的產品被客戶群視為更好的產品時，這是一個很好的狀態，我在開場白中與大家分享了我們的用戶群的淨推薦值指標。這才是有幫助的。當然，在 COVID 環境下，有助於提高我們產品的性能和認知度的動力之一是，我們大家多年來一直坐在一起討論什麼是推動上游需求的殺手級應用。因為我們知道某些已建成網路的致命弱點是上行頻寬受限。

Look, the answer is a pandemic. And the reality of everybody moving to home and sitting on video calls all day, all of a sudden, upstream bandwidth has become pretty important in homes. And fiber, given its symmetrical characteristics is great. And the dynamic around that, I think, has been incredibly helpful, and I expect that our share growth and our opportunity to do well will come from the symmetrical nature of our architecture that we put in place.

瞧，答案就是一場大流行病。而現實情況是，每個人都回到家中，整天進行視訊通話，突然之間，上行頻寬對於家庭來說變得非常重要。而纖維，由於其對稱特性而非常棒。我認為，圍繞這一點的動態非常有幫助，我預計我們的份額成長和成功的機會將來自於我們所建立的架構的對稱性。

And then you can go through a whole bunch of other things that help it out, which is attractive bundling. You've got a great wireless product that goes with it. You have an SVOD product that sits on top of it that makes it attractive. All those things help our market effectiveness, and we can get even more market effective if we have a little less of a patchwork in our fiber footprint.

然後，你可以透過一大堆其他的方式來解決這個問題，這就是有吸引力的捆綁。您已經擁有了一款出色的無線產品。您擁有一款位於其頂部的 SVOD 產品，這使其極具吸引力。所有這些都有助於提高我們的市場有效性，如果我們的光纖覆蓋範圍不那麼雜亂，我們的市場有效性就會更高。

And it's what I said earlier that you shouldn't think about the next incremental homes we add as being similar to the previous homes because we're now filling in areas where we already have people trained. We have a marketing presence. There's some footprint that's in place. The core central office equipment is already there. So you're literally just having to string fiber and connect it to infrastructure that's already there. And the investment-to-revenue return interval should be shorter. And so those are all good things around that.

正如我之前所說，您不應該認為我們接下來增加的房屋與以前的房屋相似，因為我們現在正在填補已經培訓過人員的區域。我們有行銷機構。有一些足跡已經存在。核心局端設備已經到位。因此，您實際上只需要連接光纖並將其連接到現有的基礎設施。而投資到收益回報間隔應該更短。所以這些都是好事。

And then I would finally tell you, look, I disagree with you. I actually think there's a lot of unconnected households. There's a lot of unconnected apartments. There's a lot of unconnected single-family homes in certain geographic areas of the city. That's why we have a digital divide problem. If you go into South Central Dallas, you're going to find a lot of unconnected living units that are there. If you go into urban Los Angeles, you're going to find a lot of unconnected living units that are there.

然後我最終會告訴你，看，我不同意你的觀點。我實際上認為有很多家庭沒有連網。有很多不相連的公寓。該市某些地理區域有許多不相連的獨戶住宅。這就是我們面臨數位落差問題的原因。如果你去達拉斯中南部，你會發現那裡有很多不相連的居住單位。如果你走進洛杉磯市區，你會發現那裡有很多不相連的居住單位。

I believe some of these architectures that are coming out and frankly, if policy gets right, that you can open up some of these places for growth. The Universal Service program gets reformed into an effective fashion, which I think it's time that from a policy perspective in our country, we should look at that, it makes fixed broadband more affordable. Then people who have made the utility decision to only have wireless in their household because it was good enough now may decide they want to go into the robust area of streaming and distance learning and choose to invest. And we have architectures now with things like millimeter wave that many instances could probably give different price points, attract those segments of the market that have been out of the fixed business with a good enough or reasonable enough broadband offer that I think also has some growth over time.

我相信其中一些架構正在出現，坦白說，如果政策正確，你可以開放其中一些地方來實現成長。普遍服務計劃進行了有效的改革，我認為現在是時候從我們國家的政策角度來看待它了，它使固定寬頻更加實惠。然後，那些因為現在無線網路已經足夠好而決定只在家中使用無線網路的人可能會決定進入串流媒體和遠距學習的強大領域並選擇投資。我們現在擁有諸如毫米波之類的架構，在許多情況下可能會給出不同的價格點，以足夠好或足夠合理的寬頻服務吸引那些已經退出固定業務的市場部分，我認為隨著時間的推移也會有一些增長。

On the sports side, I think I've said before, and I don't think my point of view changes, that sports content is important to our linear business, our cable networks business to make sure we have enough of it that sustains that business and keeps it an attractive, must-have offering, an offering that our customers want to have in that cable bundle. And we've invested in a way to make sure that, that's the case, and we like our properties.

在體育方面，我想我以前說過，而且我認為我的觀點不會改變，體育內容對我們的線性業務、我們的有線電視網絡業務很重要，以確保我們擁有足夠的體育內容來維持這項業務，並使其成為一種有吸引力的、必備的產品，一種我們的客戶希望在有線電視套餐中擁有的產品。我們已經投資了一種方法，以確保情況確實如此，而且我們喜歡我們的財產。

We like our engagement with the NBA. They're a great partner to work with, the demographic on the sports, great. They're flexible in their approach to things. I think our agreement with Major League Baseball allows us to adjust as viewership dynamics change over time, which is important because I think we're going to see platform distribution dynamics change over time. And they've been a good partner around that, I think will be a good partner moving forward. I think college and what we do with the NCAA and the tournament is just kind of one of those things that culturally is relevant. And I think our mix is really good in that regard.

我們喜歡與 NBA 的合作。他們是一個很好的合作夥伴，在體育人口統計方面也很棒。他們處理事情的方式很靈活。我認為我們與美國職棒大聯盟的協議使我們能夠隨著觀眾動態隨時間的變化而進行調整，這很重要，因為我認為我們將看到平台分銷動態隨著時間的推移而變化。他們在這方面一直是很好的合作夥伴，我認為未來也會繼續成為很好的合作夥伴。我認為大學以及我們與 NCAA 和錦標賽的合作只是與文化相關的事情之一。我認為從這個方面來說我們的組合確實很好。

I don't see going deeper into sports is the direction for WarnerMedia. My view is we need to be -- partner at the right amount, but our goal is not to become known as the sports company. And so I think we've been pretty disciplined around where we choose to get into it. We need to have the right amount in our portfolio. We feel pretty good about where we are about that. And I think that's probably enough.

我不認為深入體育領域是華納媒體的方向。我的觀點是，我們需要以適當的數量合作，但我們的目標不是成為知名的體育公司。所以我認為我們在選擇進入哪個領域時一直非常謹慎。我們的投資組合中需要有適當的數量。我們對於目前的情況感到非常滿意。我認為這可能就足夠了。

And in the near term, our goal is to continue to get ourselves into a position where our on-demand platforms and our new distribution platforms, SVOD and AVOD, are scaled. And our strategies on that right now are general entertainment content. And you'll probably see, as we move through AVOD, maybe we do some additional live work that we have coming forward that may not be sports centric. So more to come on that, but that's our near-term focus as we move forward.

在短期內，我們的目標是繼續擴大我們的點播平台和新分銷平台 SVOD 和 AVOD 的規模。我們目前的策略是提供一般娛樂內容。您可能會看到，隨著我們通過 AVOD 前進，我們可能會做一些額外的現場工作，這些工作可能不是以體育為中心的。關於這一點我們還會做更多，但這是我們近期的重點。

Your next question comes from the line of Michael Rollins from Citi.

您的下一個問題來自花旗銀行的 Michael Rollins。

Two, if I could. First, I was curious if you could quantify some of the cost-cutting benefits in the third quarter and then size that opportunity of how it might flow through over the next 1 to 2 years. And then separately, one of the responses to the pandemic seems to be an acceleration of companies going digital and to software-based solutions. I was curious if you can unpack for the Business Wireline segment how you think about those opportunities for AT&T to try to take advantage of that acceleration relative to some of the risks you may also have from legacy revenue and any lagging cyclical impacts as companies try to respond to the recession.

如果可以的話，兩個。首先，我很好奇您是否可以量化第三季的部分成本削減效益，然後評估該效益在未來 1 到 2 年內可能如何發揮。另外，應對疫情的措施之一似乎是加速企業走向數位化和基於軟體的解決方案。我很好奇，您是否可以為商業有線部門闡述一下，您如何看待 AT&T 嘗試利用這種加速的機會，相對於您可能面臨的來自傳統收入的一些風險以及公司試圖應對經濟衰退時任何滯後的周期性影響。

Yes. So Mike, let me -- I'll take the second part of that, and then ask John to maybe round out the first part of your question.

是的。那麼麥克，讓我——我將回答第二部分，然後請約翰回答你問題的第一部分。

So managing through the wire -- the legacy wireline issues in our business segment, that's not anything new. In fact, I think I'd like to kind of declare we're on the downhill side of that issue.

因此，透過有線方式進行管理——我們業務部門中遺留的有線問題，並不是什麼新鮮事。事實上，我想說我們在這個問題上已經走下坡了。

My point of view on what matters to our business, subscribers moving forward, is great connectivity and great infrastructure. And more and more, it's a mix of what they need for their core networks matched with what they need for their wireless services. And not an insignificant part of our strength and our subscriber numbers have come from us marrying those 2 things together.

我認為對我們的業務、未來的用戶來說最重要的是良好的連結性和良好的基礎設施。而且，他們的核心網路需求和無線服務需求越來越多地融合在一起。我們的優勢和用戶數量的很大一部分來自於我們將這兩件事結合在一起。

We're doing much better in the wireless space on customers that we sell other network to. And I believe we have opportunity to do more. And it gets back to my point of view of where we put our fiber and how we deal with the mid-market and how we connect mid-market to the core fixed infrastructure that they need to use for major parts of their business and marry it to the reality that all businesses are mobile in some way, shape or form right now. I think that's our sweet spot moving forward, and that's where our growth can come from. And that's where we have the team focused right now.

相較於我們向其銷售其他網路的客戶，我們在無線領域的表現要好得多。我相信我們還有機會做得更多。這又回到了我的觀點：我們將光纖放在哪裡，我們如何處理中端市場，我們如何將中端市場連接到他們需要用於其主要業務的核心固定基礎設施，並將其與所有企業現在都以某種方式、形狀或形式移動的現實結合起來。我認為這是我們前進的最佳點，也是我們的成長來源。這就是我們團隊現在關注的重點。

And so I think the play in business is a core connectivity play. It gets back to my comments that we are in a very unique position, that if we put that fiber in because of the products and services that we have on core, complex network connectivity that we do so well on with highly secure corporate networks, whether they be midsized or large, plus then what you pick up in the smaller segment of the market for unmanaged broadband connections that come off the back of that fiber mixed with our strength in wireless, that's a winning combination for us. And that's where we should be focused. And in fact, that's where we are focused right now.

所以我認為商業中的作用是核心連結作用。回到我的評論，我們處於一個非常獨特的地位，如果我們因為我們在核心、複雜網絡連接方面的產品和服務而將光纖投入使用，我們在高度安全的企業網絡（無論是中型還是大型）方面做得很好，再加上你在較小的非託管寬頻連接市場中獲得的收益，這些收益來自光纖的支持，再加上我們在無線方面的優勢，這對我們來說是一個成功的組合。這才是我們該關注的重點。事實上，這正是我們現在關注的重點。

And that's what the enterprise organization is spending their time and energy on and how we're equipping our distribution, how we're setting up our distribution channels that both can sell wireless and basic fiber connectivity into these areas. And that will be our meat and potatoes and what that business is built on. And I think that there's nothing more complicated about it than that.

這就是企業組織投入時間和精力的事情，以及我們如何裝備我們的分銷，如何建立我們的分銷管道，以便向這些地區銷售無線和基本光纖連接。這將是我們的主業，也是我們業務的基礎。我認為沒有什麼比這更複雜的了。

John, let me just add. Mike, to your question, we added close to 400,000 nonphone postpaid net adds. A lot of that were the kind of devices that business and education uses. And so we're seeing -- what you are discussing, we are seeing that aspect in our postpaid numbers already. Additionally, we had about 4 million connected devices and other connections in the quarter. So what you're referring to is happening today at different levels certainly of ARPUs, but we are very well connected.

約翰，讓我補充一下。麥克，回答你的問題，我們增加了近 40 萬個非電話後付費淨增用戶。其中很多是商業和教育所使用的設備。因此我們看到——您正在討論的，我們已經在後付費數字中看到了這一點。此外，本季我們擁有約 400 萬台連網裝置和其他連線。所以，您所指的情況在今天確實在 ARPU 的不同層面上發生，但我們之間的聯繫非常緊密。

And the last thing I'd say is on the FirstNet business that we have, a lot of the connections, the 1.7 million connections we have, some of those are those connected devices as opposed to just the phone aspect of it. So it's happening now. We're responding, and I feel good about it.

最後我想說的是，關於我們的 FirstNet 業務，很多連接，我們擁有的 170 萬個連接，其中一些是連接設備，而不僅僅是電話方面。所以現在它正在發生。我們正在做出回應，我對此感覺很好。

With regard to the cost-cutting activities, let me just point out, we set a target of about $6 billion or we talked about that target last -- at the beginning of the year and in October on a movement forward. We are continuing to work towards that goal. We've seen some immediate benefits already, and John referred to it: our review of our distribution capabilities, our push towards digital, which is a more streamlined, simpler approach, improving the quality of that. The team has made great progress that customers are happy with, realigning our stores. We have the opportunity that we had, through state mandates, well over 1,000 stores closed that we made. And I think we had a timing opportunity to adjust that and to shift some of that to authorized agents at a lower cost, relocate and close some stores to be very efficient. That's going on.

關於削減成本活動，我只想指出，我們設定了約 60 億美元的目標，或者說我們去年（年初和 10 月）討論過這個目標。我們將繼續努力實現這一目標。我們已經看到了一些直接的好處，約翰提到了這一點：我們對分銷能力的審查，我們對數位化的推動，這是一種更精簡、更簡單的方法，可以提高品質。團隊在重新調整我們的商店方面取得了巨大進步，客戶對此感到滿意。我們有機會透過國家強制要求關閉 1,000 多家商店。我認為我們有一個時機來調整這一點，將部分業務以較低的成本轉移給授權代理商，重新安置和關閉一些商店，以提高效率。事情就是這樣的。

We told you before that we had virtualized close to 75% of our network activities. We're continuing to do that. I can tell you in my finance organization, we probably have on the new company combined, have 125 or so systems we use. And we've got a plan now to take out and reduce, combine, consolidate probably 2/3 of those, and we're starting on that.

我們之前告訴過您，我們已經將近 75% 的網路活動虛擬化。我們將繼續這樣做。我可以告訴你，在我的財務部門，我們新公司總共使用了大約 125 個系統。我們現在有一個計劃，要取出、減少、合併、鞏固其中的 2/3，我們正在開始實施這個計劃。

So those are the kind of flavor of the items we're doing. We're confident we're going to get there over the next few years. We've already gotten significant amounts of it through our organizational alignment, through our benefit efficiencies, but you can believe that we'll continue to do that.

這些就是我們正在做的項目的風格。我們有信心在未來幾年內實現這一目標。我們已經透過組織調整和福利效率獲得了大量收益，但您可以相信我們會繼續這樣做。

The best point I can make to you on these 2 things is these 2: We're in the middle of a pandemic. We added 1 million postpaid customers in mobility. We had significant impacts on our roaming, and our EBITDA was essentially flat. It does that because you do really good cost controls. I could tell you that same story on our Business Wireline. And look at those results, and their EBITDA actually grew and margins grew. That's from these transformational efforts really taking hold and the team really doing a good job.

關於這兩件事，我能向你指出的最好的一點是：我們正處於一場大流行之中。我們增加了 100 萬個行動後付費客戶。我們的漫遊受到了重大影響，我們的 EBITDA 基本上持平。之所以能做到這一點，是因為你確實很好地控制了成本。我可以在我們的商業專線節目上告訴你同樣的故事。看看這些結果，他們的 EBITDA 實際上成長了，利潤率也成長了。這是因為這些轉型努力確實取得了成效，而且團隊也確實做得很好。

I can't give you specific dollar amounts by categories. I have those, but we're not disclosing those. We're just working through this whole process. We've got a lot more work to do, but the progress so far is encouraging.

我無法給你按類別劃分的具體金額。我有這些，但我們不會透露。我們只是在努力完成整個過程。我們還有很多工作要做，但迄今為止的進展令人鼓舞。

Great. And we have time for one last question, operator.

偉大的。接線員，我們還有時間回答最後一個問題。

Okay. That question comes from the line of Doug Mitchelson from Crédit Suisse.

好的。這個問題來自瑞士信貸的道格·米切爾森 (Doug Mitchelson)。

For John Stankey, a few questions bundled together. I know the HBO Max initiative is a big initiative for you. If you can update us 5 months in on learning so far, engagement churn, the like. And if you can give us any context you're willing to around the international launches next year. How much of the world will be launched? And you mentioned the advertising-based service. I'm not sure if you're prepared to discuss how that will be different from the existing HBO Max.

對約翰·斯坦基來說，有幾個問題集中在一起。我知道 HBO Max 計劃對您來說是一項重大舉措。如果您能向我們更新迄今為止 5 個月來的學習、參與度流失等。如果您願意向我們提供有關明年國際發布的任何信息，請告知我們。世界上有多少地方將被發射？您提到了基於廣告的服務。我不確定您是否準備好討論它與現有的 HBO Max 有何不同。

And then tailing onto that, if you don't mind, could you carry that into the state of play for the pay TV bundle, given that, in theory, the HBO Max initiative puts pressure on the pay TV bundle but over at DIRECTV and AT&T TV, you're trying to hold the bundle together? Do you see accelerating cord cutting in the future from the current 5% decline level across traditional and virtual MVPDs, given what you're doing and what you see in streaming across the industry? That would be helpful.

然後繼續討論這個問題，如果您不介意的話，您能否將其帶入付費電視捆綁包的現狀，因為理論上，HBO Max 計劃對付費電視捆綁包施加了壓力，但在 DIRECTV 和 AT&T TV，您正試圖將捆綁包保持在一起？考慮到您目前所做的事情以及您對整個串流媒體行業的觀察，您是否認為未來傳統和虛擬 MVPD 的下降幅度將從目前的 5% 下降到現在的 5%？那將會很有幫助。

Sure, Doug. Let me see if I can kind of tick them off. So on Max, I would say, absent the pandemic, the game has played out much the way we expected it to play out. The piece that the pandemic has put a little bit of a struggle on is it's -- the customer acquisition game is an originals game. The customer retention game in SVOD is a library game.

當然，道格。讓我看看我是否能把它們解決掉。因此，關於 Max，我想說，如果沒有疫情，比賽的進展與我們預期的大致相同。疫情為客戶獲取遊戲帶來了一些困難，因為客戶獲取遊戲是一場原創遊戲。SVOD 中的客戶保留遊戲是一場圖書館遊戲。

Our library is performing incredibly strong relative to our customer base. In fact, we've shared with you, we had an objective of how many minutes a day we wanted a customer to engage with Max. We've well exceeded our expectations on that, and it's on the strength of the library. And the best part about that is it's largely our owned library, what we already own the intellectual property on. It's not what we're leasing from others. I think in our top 10 library shows right now, there's one leased piece of content, maybe 2 that make it into the top 10. The rest is our own intellectual property.

相對於我們的客戶群而言，我們的圖書館表現非常強勁。事實上，我們已經與你們分享過，我們有一個目標，就是我們希望客戶每天花多少分鐘與 Max 互動。在這方面我們已經遠遠超出了我們的預期，這要歸功於圖書館的實力。最好的部分是，它基本上是我們自己的圖書館，我們已經擁有它的智慧財產權。這不是我們從別人那裡租來的東西。我認為，在我們目前的十大圖書館節目中，有一個租賃內容，也許有兩個進入前十名。其餘部分都是我們自己的智慧財產權。

So the pandemic put us in a tough spot on originals. We didn't have the funnel. We were running the market and the pandemic got in the way with it. We couldn't finish a lot of the work that we had underway. It's that stream of new originals that allows you to kind of grow the customer base, and the team has done a really good job at doing that. I mean I'm not disappointed. We're well ahead of what our initial plans were that we laid out for you a year ago in October. But nonetheless, we know we probably could have done better if we have the right kind of lineup of robust originals that we had originally slated. And that will now start to ease as production picks up.

因此，疫情讓我們在原創作品方面陷入了困境。我們沒有漏斗。我們正在經營市場，但疫情阻礙了我們的營運。我們無法完成許多正在進行的工作。正是這些新的原創作品讓你能夠擴大客戶群，而團隊在這方面做得非常出色。我的意思是我並不失望。我們已經遠遠超出了我們一年前十月為您制定的初步計劃。但儘管如此，我們知道，如果我們擁有最初計劃的一系列強大的原創產品，我們可能會做得更好。隨著產量的回升，這種情況將開始緩解。

So I would say everything is about where I expected it would be. There's some usability issues on the platform that we'd like to improve on the user interface. We made conscious decisions to launch with those to get time to market. Is software being written to improve those? And will you see every 45 days a new release coming out that will make the product even better, and customers will see that occur? Yes. But that's just part of maturing and scaling a product, and I feel good about the ramp. And once we think we've got those things all in alignment and have the right content, it's a good question to ask if -- should customer acquisition pace increase. And I think we'd all like to see that happen when the formula is right.

所以我想說一切都如我所料。該平台存在一些可用性問題，我們希望改進使用者介面。我們有意識地決定推出這些產品，以縮短上市時間。是否有軟體可以改善這些情況？您是否會看到每 45 天發布一次新版本，使產品變得更好，並且客戶會看到這種情況？是的。但這只是產品成熟和擴展的一部分，我對這一成長感到滿意。一旦我們認為我們已經把這些事情安排好了，並且有了正確的內容，那麼一個很好的問題是——是否應該加快客戶獲取速度。我認為，當公式正確時，我們都希望看到這種情況發生。

On international, as we've shared with you before, our focus right now is on Latin America and certain parts of Western Europe. And so that's where you will see the focus in '21 as we roll out. Those teams are mobilized and working on that now. And just like we had a domestic U.S. launch, the same thing has to be put in place in all of these countries to move forward. The subscriber counts that we gave you in October were consistent with what we thought would be our international gains coming from those regions, and we are still holding by those and have no reasons to be in any different place than we were before.

在國際方面，正如我們之前分享的，我們現在的重點是拉丁美洲和西歐的某些地區。因此，隨著我們推出這些產品，您將會看到 21 年的重點。這些團隊現在已經動員起來並開始致力於此事。就像我們在美國國內推出一樣，所有這些國家也必須採取同樣的措施才能向前邁進。我們十月份提供的用戶數量與我們認為的這些地區的國際收益一致，我們仍然保持這些數字，並且沒有理由與以前有任何不同。

AVOD will be an important feature add on because many of you write about the price point of HBO Max, which I will still maintain, given the premium content as recognized by our performance recently in the Emmys, that there are many customers that want quality and they want to be able to go in and see something that has some depth in it, depth of seasons, and we offer that. And as a result of that, there's a segment of the market that's willing to pay for noncommercial-driven, high-quality content. But there's a segment of the market that probably wants a lower price point. And AVOD not only allows us to broaden the offering, the amount of content we put on the platform, but allows us to hit a different price point and attract different segments of the market in as a result of that.

AVOD 將是一項重要的附加功能，因為你們中的許多人都寫了關於 HBO Max 的價格點的文章，我仍然會堅持這一點，鑑於我們最近在艾美獎上的表現所認可的優質內容，許多客戶想要高質量的內容，他們希望能夠看到一些有深度、有季節深度的內容，而我們提供這些。因此，市場上有一部分人願意為非商業驅動的高品質內容付費。但市場上有一部分人可能希望價格更低。AVOD 不僅使我們能夠擴大產品範圍，增加平台上的內容數量，還使我們能夠達到不同的價格點，從而吸引不同的細分市場。

We think that will be an important market expansion capability for us in accelerating our ability to attack different parts of the market. And frankly, it allows us to think differently about how we use other products and services on the platform when you can use both subscription and advertising to support it. So it's a really important, strategic issue for us to have an ability to use advertising and a scaled advertising play as a means to offer other products and services.

我們認為這將成為我們加速進軍不同市場領域的重要市場拓展能力。坦白說，當您可以使用訂閱和廣告來支援它時，它使我們能夠以不同的方式思考如何使用平台上的其他產品和服務。因此，對我們來說，利用廣告和規模化廣告作為提供其他產品和服務的手段的能力是一個非常重要的策略議題。

And then your last question on the pay TV bundle. I don't know what the cord-cutting rate is going to be over the next couple of quarters, so to speak. I expect that we saw a little bit of an uptick. I think a lot of that was driven by what I suggested earlier, which is when the virtual MVPDs got out of a highly promotional pricing game, there's the segment of the market that backed out at that point. We saw a little bit of that step-up as a result of it.

最後一個問題是關於付費電視套餐。可以這麼說，我不知道未來幾季的剪線率會是多少。我預計我們會看到一點上漲。我認為這在很大程度上是由我之前提到的推動的，即當虛擬 MVPD 擺脫高度促銷的定價遊戲時，市場的一部分就會退出。我們由此看到了一點點進步。

I've said before and I still maintain, there's a certain number of sports-consuming households that are going to be the stickier households in the pay TV bundle. That when we kind of get down to that 55 million, 60 million household range, we're probably going to see a little bit of a plateauing as a result of that. That doesn't mean that the bundle stays the way that it is. I think there'll be a number of channels in the bundle that probably fall away over time, and it gets a little bit thinner.

我以前就說過，而且我仍然堅持認為，有一定數量的體育消費家庭將成為付費電視套餐中更粘性的家庭。當我們將家庭數量降至 5500 萬到 6000 萬時，我們可能會看到由此產生的一點停滯現象。這並不意味著捆綁包會保持原樣。我認為捆綁包中的一些頻道可能會隨著時間的推移而逐漸消失，並且會變得越來越薄。

But from my point of view, the reason we're doing HBO Max, and one of the reasons that we expected walking in, is we want to be where the customers want to be. And we're focused on building a platform that's relevant for the next decade. And we have a great opportunity to pick those customers up, to have a great opportunity to have both a subscription and an ad-supported platform that we manage and we control, that we have a direct relationship with the customer on where we not only do the distribution, but we own a large amount of the content that the customer is interfacing with. That is a good place for us to be strategically over time, and we're leaning in to do that.

但從我的角度來看，我們推出 HBO Max 的原因，以及我們預期其受歡迎的原因之一，是我們希望出現在客戶想要出現的地方。我們致力於建立一個與未來十年相關的平台。我們有很好的機會吸引這些客戶，有很好的機會擁有一個我們管理和控制的訂閱和廣告支援平台，我們與客戶有直接的關係，我們不僅進行分發，而且我們擁有客戶互動的大量內容。從長遠來看，這對我們來說是一個很好的策略定位，我們正致力於實現這一目標。

And I'm more in tune with that being important to us and having a great and growing broadband business that complements it. And that's whether it's broadband by fixed or mobile, that's where our business needs to be, and that's the focus on what we need to do going forward. So with that, Amir, I'm going to wrap it up here, and I think we're done taking questions.

我更加認同這一點對我們很重要，並且擁有一個與之相輔相成的偉大且不斷發展的寬頻業務。無論是固定寬頻還是行動寬頻，這都是我們的業務所在，也是我們未來需要關注的重點。阿米爾，我的提問就到此結束了，我想我們的提問也已經結束了。

First of all, thank you all for joining in today. I hope that you see that the business is demonstrating that they're working hard, and they're executing with some great team work. And that's yielded the performance in the market that you saw here.

首先，感謝大家今天的參加。我希望您看到，這家企業正在努力工作，並且正在透過出色的團隊合作來執行任務。這就是您在這裡看到的市場表現。

We're continuing to work on our efficiencies and our effectiveness. As John alluded to you, I think we're demonstrating that we can yield those and keep the cash flows coming in the way we expected. And we're plowing those strategically back into the market to make sure that we can continue to grow this business and be competitive. There is no reason that a customer shouldn't choose AT&T, and it's our job to invest in this business in a way that we keep our customers with us, and we can grow our base, and that's what we intend to do.

我們將繼續努力提高效率和效力。正如約翰向您提到的那樣，我認為我們正在證明我們可以實現這些目標並保持現金流按照我們預期的方式流入。我們正在將這些策略性地重新投入市場，以確保我們能夠繼續發展業務並保持競爭力。客戶沒有理由不選擇 AT&T，我們的工作就是投資這項業務，以便留住客戶，擴大我們的客戶群，這就是我們打算做的事情。

We'll be disciplined in our capital allocation as we move forward. We've done a great job in restructuring our profile. And as a result of that, we're going to continue to support the dividend and reinvest those free cash flows in a way that grow among those priorities I just talked about.

隨著我們不斷前進，我們將嚴格控制資本配置。我們在重塑形象方面做得很好。因此，我們將繼續支持股息，並以我剛才談到的優先事項的方式重新投資這些自由現金流。

So it's a tough environment, but I think we're managing well. We've shown a great degree of resiliency. I have confidence we're going get to the other side of this pandemic as we roll through next year. And we have the wherewithal to do that in a way that we can continue to invest in our business strategically.

所以這是一個艱難的環境，但我認為我們管理得很好。我們表現出了極大的韌性。我相信，隨著明年的到來，我們一定能夠戰勝這場疫情。我們有足夠的資金來做到這一點，以便我們能夠繼續對我們的業務進行策略性投資。

Thanks for being with us today. I hope the new format that we used today works for you. If you want to give me some feedback, I'm certainly welcome to take it to the extent that you want to give me some thoughts on that. Everybody stay safe. We'll see you next quarter.

感謝您今天與我們同在。我希望我們今天使用的新的格式適合您。如果您想給我一些回饋，我當然歡迎您就此提出一些想法。大家注意安全。我們將於下個季度與您見面。

Ladies and gentlemen, that does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation and for using AT&T TeleConference. You may now disconnect.

女士們、先生們，今天的會議到此結束。感謝您的參與和使用 AT&T 電話會議。您現在可以斷開連線。