Charter Communications Inc ($CHTR) Q4 2025 Earnings Call

Thanks, Stefan. And 2025, we continue to compete for customers by delivering great products at great prices with continuously improving service. We added nearly 2 million mobile lines for a growth of 19%, and we remained the fastest-growing mobile provider in the United States. In video, we dramatically reduced our video losses, and in the fourth quarter, we grew our video customers despite well-known headwinds. The video product improvements we've made over the past 2 years, which improve connectivity relationships, are having an impact. In internet, competition for new customers remains high, but customer losses improved year-over-year. Our revenue was down about a half of percent in 2025, driven by customer losses and a challenging political advertising comparison, while EBITDA grew by about half percent. The operating environment for new sales, in particular internet, continues to reflect low move rates and higher mobile substitution, along with both expanded cell phone internet competition and fiber overlap growth, similar to earlier in the year. Collectively, that drove fourth quarter internet sales slightly lower year-over-year. Churn improved year-over-year, as expected, given last year's ACP-related impacts. And internet churn, including non-pay churn, remains at low levels.

With 2026 in full swing, our shareholders should know that we are a highly competitive group, and we intend to win in the residential and business connectivity marketplace. In this environment, getting back to positive net additions is a game of inches. We're incredibly focused on one, more clearly messaging our superior value and utility, and two, providing the best quality service in the market in a way that is recognized by our customers, and our service is a competitive advantage. Let me go through how I believe we'll win. Assuming regulatory approval of Cox, Spectrum will cover over 70 million households, which gives us additional scale to develop new products and services, serve more business customers, and save customers significant money. In 2026, we'll nearly complete our rural buildout, providing us with over 1.7 million new subsidized rural passings with growth for years to come, as well as upside from the densification of higher growth areas in places like Texas, Florida, and the Carolinas. We're gig capable everywhere, and by the end of this year, 50% of the current Spectrum network will be upgraded to symmetrical and multi-gig service, with significant work on the remaining 50% in flight and moving to completion in 2027. Those capabilities matter long-term as customer data usage continues to increase. And we're working with content owners in Silicon Valley to create applications and next-generation products like Spectrum Front Row. That's immersive content with Apple and the NBA that makes full use of our ubiquitously deployed largely fallow fiber-based network. Bandwidth-rich products have always followed our network capabilities. And think of the last few hundred feet of our fiber-powered network as 1.8 gigahertz of contiguous spectrum delivered at full capacity to each individual home and business with the ability to place cellular radios nearly everywhere along the way. Fiber deep power and right away. We already have a fully converged connectivity service in 100% of our footprint. Now with expanding hybrid MNO capabilities through CBRS and Wi-Fi to drive our seamless connectivity advantage at gigabit speeds wherever you go.

So data usage will continue to increase for both wired and wireless networks. And customers don't know or care which network they're on as they move about. It just has to work. That is the service we uniquely provide. In mobile, we have a structural and strategic mobile reselling agreement with Verizon for current and future services. And we'll launch an additional MVNO for business with T-Mobile in the next 6 months. Nearly 90% of Spectrum Mobile traffic goes over our network already at higher speeds making us the fastest mobile operator with the best prices. Mobile's profitable. It'll continue to grow and improves broadband churn meaningfully with the opportunity to drive more internet sales. Our network carries more mobile traffic than any operator in our footprint. So we are a facilities-based provider of mobile services with 5G macro cell towers as backup. Our owner's economics of a differentiated network create long-term advantage, which means we can save customers over $1,000 in a single year with internet and mobile. And now we can do the same with video. Our video product and platform is now a killer app. When our video customers activate their included apps, video and broadband churn improvement is meaningful. Our video product can become another unique selling tool. Seamless entertainment with all the key programmer apps included as part of our service, over $125 of value per month. And finally, customers have a platform in Zumo that brings unified search and discovery for all your live TV and apps. Utility and value.

At Spectrum, we've made huge investments in our 100% US-based sales and service over the past 5 years with our own employees whose tenure and skill improve each month, supported by market-leading pay and benefits. That investment is already made, and it is a competitive advantage. And we continue to invest in technology, including AI, to increase customer satisfaction through self-service where customers want, and enhancing our employees' service capabilities. That's across sales, call center services, field operations, and the network itself. In 2026, for the first time, granular incentives will include net promoter scores. We have competitive advantage with our service capabilities, and we're going to make sure we earn credit, the reputation that reflects that significant investment from our customers, one by one. And we're going to guarantee all of it. We'll guarantee internet service through a new Invincible WiFi product we'll launch in February. Symmetrical and multi-gigabit service with a WiFi 7 router, and battery backup and backup 5G service, seamlessly switched on the same SSID for storms or outage, as well as Wi-Fi 7 extenders for larger homes. Invincible Wi-Fi is a market-first product combining Wi-Fi 7 with 5G and battery backup. Over a year ago, we deployed the nation's first wireline and wireless service commitment guaranteeing transparency, reliability, and same-day installation and service. Internally, we're now moving that service window target to 2 hours and 1 hour for business. At your doorstep from the time you call. None of our competitors match our service here. In addition to backing our customer service guarantee with credits, beginning in February, we'll now guarantee you $1,000 of savings per year when you take internet and two lines of mobile from Spectrum. If we can't save you $1,000 or more when compared to the big three telco carriers, we'll credit the difference on your bill during the first year. Guaranteed connectivity, guaranteed service, and guaranteed savings. With the best products in the US, uniquely serviced by US employees 24/7. We want to be America's connectivity company with hyper-local service delivered by your neighbors or our local employees.

And with community investment, including unbiased hyper-local Spectrum News. All of this will expand to Cox following closing, assuming regulatory approvals. Our plan there is to introduce Spectrum pricing and packaging, rapidly grow mobile, similarly return to internet growth, and given Cox's low video penetration and our capabilities, we expect to grow video in the Cox footprint for a period of time as well. I also believe the combination of our very complimentary B2B capabilities will create growth synergies we didn't anticipate when we did the deal. Winning connectivity relationships in a cyclical and newly competitive environment is a game of inches. I'm not projecting broadband relationship growth this year, but we expect to see an improved trajectory from the investments we've made over the past 3 years. The recipe for winning here is simple. Best connectivity, best overall value with the best service. And we aren't perfect, and we own our mistakes with customers, but we are improving the way we communicate our value, utility, and quality service across our footprint. But I do believe we're the best positioned company in the connectivity industry, and we will get better. From a financial perspective, we expect our operating plan to deliver EBITDA growth this year. And the investments we've made to lower service transactions and our efficiency programs, including early benefits from customer and employee focused AI tools, will continue to provide a tailwind for many years to come.

2025 was our peak year of capital expenditure. And capital expenditures after this year will decline significantly. Free cash flow will take off from an already significant amount. We expect our capital intensity to return to 13% to 14% of revenue by 2028 at Charter standalone. And we can probably do the same even with the Cox integration. One of the bigger debates around Charter has been about the best way to deploy our significant free cash flow. And that cash flow is meaningful. It's about to become much larger. Debating how to allocate that cash flow is a first-class problem to have in my mind, and Jessica will provide an update on our balance sheet strategy and capital return priorities in a moment. But the key focus for me and real driver for the team and for value creation of our company is to make sure we deliver long-term customer, EBITDA, and cash flow growth, and demonstrate that long-term growth rate for investors along the way. If we do that, the rest will take care of itself. Now, I'll pass it over to Jessica.