Buoyed by LTE rollouts, American Tower reported increasing revenues even as impacts from foreign currency caused a 22% slide in profits.
Total revenue for the quarter was up 13% year-over-year to $807.9 million. American Tower reported domestic rental and management revenue growth of 10% to nearly $530 million, while revenue from rental and management of international sites boomed by 22.8% to $266.6 million. Net income for the quarter was down 22% from the same period last year to $180 million, which the company blamed primarily on “fluctuations in foreign currency exchange rates related to intercompany loans and similar unaffiliated balances.”
“Consumers in the U.S. and around the world love their smartphones and tablets, continuously upgrading devices and using more applications and bandwidth. Leading mobile operators are aggressively upgrading their networks to capture this business, further driving demand for tower space,” said Jim Taiclet, CEO of American Tower in a statement. “Consequently, strong leasing activity across our global portfolio led to core organic growth of over 9% in the U.S. and 14% in our international segment in the third quarter.”
Taiclet added that the company anticipates strong leasing demands going forward, and noted that it has strengthened its asset base toward its three original markets (the U.S., Mexico and Brazil) with recently announced acquisitions of Global Tower Partners and sites from Nextel International. American Tower is balancing those core markets with growth prospects for tower assets in Europe, Africa, and Asia.
So far this year, American Tower has spent $365.7 million to buy 59 domestic towers and more than 1,500 international towers. The company also had two other major transactions: the purchase of assets from Global Tower Partners that included more than 5,000 towers, right to more than 9,000 rooftop sites and more than 800 domestic managed towers, as well as about 550 Central American towers in exchange for $3.3 billion in cash plus the assumption of $1.5 billion in GTP’s debt.
American Tower’s agreement with NII Holdings Inc. involved the acquisition of nearly 2,800 communications sites in Brazil for $423.8 million and 1,666 sites in Mexico for $382.3 million.
The company said it also has agreed to buy up to 236 other towers in Brazil for about $127.1 million; that transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2014.
American Tower raised the midpoint of its guidance for full-year 2013 total rental and management revenue by $80 million.
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