Altice said its Capex guidance will remain at $1.7 billion to $1.8 billion in 2022 as it aims to accelerate investments in key growth initiatives.
Altice’s capital expenditures in Q3 2022 touched $493.6 million, up 59.6 percent, mainly driven by fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) rollout and new builds (10.5 percent of revenue excluding FTTH and new builds).
Altice has 1.9 million FTTH passings, adding 321,000 new FTTH passings, representing the highest number of quarterly incremental passings to date (vs. 44,000 new passings in Q3 2021, and 270,000 new passings in Q2 2022).
Altice recently introduced Optimum 5 Gbps (5 Gig) Fiber Internet, with symmetrical speeds up to 5 Gig. Altice also introduced Optimum 2 Gbps (2 Gig) Fiber Internet. The new 5 Gig and 2 Gig Optimum Fiber Internet tiers are now available across Long Island and Connecticut in its fiber footprint.
Altice said 41 percent of the company’s fiber passings had multi-gig speeds available and all of the company’s fiber passings are expected to be multi-gig enabled by Q1 2023.
Altice has accelerated the pace of its network edge-outs, adding 52,000 total passings in Q3 2022, and 202,000 total passings in the last twelve months. Altice is on track to add an incremental 175,000 new passings in FY 2022.
Altice has applied for subsidies for rolling out FTTH to over 222,000 homes and received subsidy grants for a total of 35,000 homes year-to-date, totaling $44 million. Altice aims to bring high speed broadband connectivity to unserved and underserved communities in Arizona, Louisiana, West Virginia, and North Carolina.
REVENUE
Altice’s revenue fell 7 percent in Q3 2022 to $2.39 billion, including residential revenue decline of 4.4 percent, business services revenue decline of 16.8 percent and News & Advertising revenue decline of 16.1 percent.
Altice added 31,000 FTTH broadband connections in Q3 2022, more than double the growth compared to Q3 2021 (+12,000), driven by both higher fiber gross additions and increased migrations of existing customers. Altice said total fiber broadband customers reached 135,000 in Q3 2022.
Residential customer connections fell 2.8 percent in Q3 2022. Residential customer net losses in the quarter were 50,000, compared to 25,000 in Q3 2021.
Residential broadband losses were 43,000 in Q3 2022, compared to 13,000 broadband losses in Q3 2021.
Video net losses were 82,000 in Q3 2022, compared to 67,000 video losses in Q3 2021.
Altice said Residential revenue declined 4.4 percent in Q3 2022 to $1.88 billion.
Residential revenue per customer in Q3 2022 declined 1.9 percent to $138.12, mostly due to the loss of higher ARPU video customers.
Altice reported Business Services revenue of $366.6 million, down 16.8 percent in Q3 2022 due to the early termination of a backhaul contract for air strands which resulted in the recognition of deferred revenue and termination fees over the amended term in the prior year period.
Optimum Mobile has approximately 236,000 mobile lines as of September 30, 2022 (5,000 additions in Q3 2022), reaching 5.5 percent penetration of the company’s residential broadband customer base.
1 Gbps (1 Gig) broadband speed sell-in to all new customers, where 1 Gig or higher services are available, was 35 percent in Q3 2022. Approximately 19 percent of the residential customer base currently take 1 Gig speeds, representing a significant growth opportunity for the Company.
Broadband speed taken by the company’s customers has nearly doubled in the past three years to 391 Mbps in Q3 2022. 42 percent of the company’s broadband customers remain on plans with download speeds of 200 Mbps or less, representing an opportunity to upgrade speeds. Broadband-only customer usage averaged 576 GB per month in Q3 2022, which is 23 percent higher than the average usage of the entire customer base (467 GB per month).
