American Tower Encouraged

Leah Stearns, American Tower Treasurer and Igor Khislavsky, Investor Relations of American Tower, met with Barclays’ Amir Rozwadowski and Sandeep Gupta to discuss the near-term trends and the company’s long-term strategy. The American Tower executives reiterated their commitment to the long-term strategy of leveraging the financial and operational resources at its disposal to continually seek out the best and most optimized means to drive longer-term AFFO growth. “While we continue to believe near-term business momentum remains fairly steady as the industry continues to wait for improved spending activity from a number of select U.S. carriers, we emerged encouraged about the prospects for an improved spending backdrop in the mid-term as densification initiatives continue to gain momentum,” the analysts wrote.

AT&T and Verizon have remained key spenders for the company as they focus on capacity and coverage issues. As news suggests, Verizon has been extremely busy building out their tower network. “While the company remains encouraged by potential spending improvement at AT&T and Sprint, thus far activity doesn’t seem to suggest a shift in spending patterns at either carrier just yet,” Rozwadowski explained. The American Tower execs also noted they were encouraged about potential demand trends for 2016, and that the integration and co-location of the Verizon assets remains on track and in-line with its expectations