Sprint reported the first year-over-year increase in total net quarterly operating revenues in over two years, a year-over-year increase of more than five times in postpaid phone net additions, and record low postpaid phone churn. Total net operating revenues were $8.25 billion grew 3 percent year-over-year and wireless net operating revenues of $7.85 billion grew nearly 5 percent year-over-year. The company also reported a net loss of $142 million, operating income of $622 million, and Adjusted EBITDA of $2.35 billion.
“We took another step forward in our plan toward sustainable profitability and cash generation with this quarter’s results,” said Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure. “The top line is now growing, we continue to take costs out of the business, and we are successfully raising money at materially lower rates to reduce our future cash interest expenses.”
Some highlights:
- Total liquidity was $11.3 billion at the end of the quarter, including $5.7 billion of cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments.
- Additionally, the company also has $1.1 billion of availability under vendor financing agreements that can be used toward the purchase of 2.5GHz network equipment.
- Last week, the company priced $3.5 billion of spectrum-backed senior secured notes at 3.36 percent, which is less than half of the company’s current effective interest rate.
- Total net additions were 740,000 in the quarter, including postpaid net additions of 344,000, prepaid net losses of 427,000, and wholesale and affiliate net additions of 823,000.
- Total postpaid churn of 1.52 percent in the quarter improved by two basis points year-over-year.
- Sprint said it aims to unlock the value of the largest spectrum holdings in the U.S. by densifying and optimizing its network to provide customers the best experience. The company’s LTE Plus Network combines a rich tri-band spectrum portfolio with the LTE Advanced features of carrier aggregation and antenna beamforming.
Sprint’s LTE Plus Network is now available in more than 250 markets and the company has started to deploy three-channel carrier aggregation in such markets as Chicago, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Dallas, Denver, Kansas City, Cleveland, and Columbus. These deployments will provide peak download speeds of more than 200Mbps on capable devices when available. The company currently has 10 three-channel carrier aggregation capable devices, including the recently launched iPhone 7 and Samsung Galaxy S7.