SBA Communications Corporation Price & Performance (SBAC)

As part of an ongoing effort to improve our earnings materials, we have made certain modifications to supplemental financial data package, we'll be providing the materials in both PDF and Excel form. Note, the revised package does not exclude any previously provided financial or operating metrics. With that, I will now turn the call over to Brent. Thank you, Mark, and good afternoon. The fourth quarter was a solid finish to the year. Results for the quarter were in line to slightly ahead of our estimates. Even with worse than assumed foreign exchange rates. Domestic new carrier activity or bookings continued to increase sequentially from the third quarter. The shift in the makeup of our new business also continued. The higher percentage coming from new lease co locations versus amendments to existing leases. Our carrier customers continue to expand their five gs mid band coverage including adding capacity for fixed wireless access. As well as extend network coverage into areas of the country that have little to no cell coverage Even with increased bookings in the quarter, our leasing application backlog grew throughout the quarter and finished at the highest level of the year. And our U. S. Based services business had its best quarter of the year as well.

The beginning of twenty twenty five is also off to a strong start. Suggesting another quarter over quarter increase in new leasing business to begin this year. Our 2025 services outlook contemplates a year over year increase in that business. Our U. S. Customers are busy and we expect to be a key partner to them this year in support of their network goals. Internationally, our fourth quarter results were in line with expectations as our customers continue to invest in their networks. In almost all of our international markets, the mobile network operators are well behind The U. S. In terms of five gs coverage. So we anticipate continued network investment to close that gap and to broadly expand coverage to underserved areas. In many ways, wireless is an even more critical service in our international markets than in The U. S. International turn unfortunately continues to be elevated largely due to customer consolidations. And we are working closely with our customers to help them achieve necessary network efficiencies. We believe the surviving customers will be stronger and better positioned for ongoing investments. And ultimately will support greater stabilization in our international cash flows. Overall, 2024 was a successful year.

While our stock performance was tendered by the headwinds of the macro interest rate environment, [indiscernible] we had several accomplishments that set us up well for the future. Operationally, we expanded and strengthened our relationships with our large [indiscernible] We grew our leasing and services backlogs refreshed our mission, vision and values and streamlined a number of our operations and processes. With regard to capital allocation, we invested over $550,000,000 in asset acquisitions, stock repurchases, and new tower builds, all while growing our dividend at an industry leading 15%. Also improved our balance sheet and liquidity position In the beginning of the year, we refinanced our $2,300,000,000 term loan, pushing out the maturity to 02/1931. Extended the maturity of our revolving credit facility and increased it from $1,500,000,000 to $2,000,000,000 and subsequently entered into a forward starting interest rate hedge reducing our future floating rate interest exposure and locking in a much lower rate than can be achieved today. In addition, in October, we refinanced $2,100,000,000 of tower securities at rates well below where those same securities would price today. We ended the year at 6.1 times net debt to adjusted EBITDA. The lowest level in our history. In February of last year, I laid out my strategic priorities focusing mostly on ways to enhance the portfolio with the goals to stabilize results grow the core business, and improve the overall quality of our assets.

Be it through inorganic growth, or new agreements with our customers. But we still have work to do we made major strides toward these goals. As announced last quarter, we entered into an agreement to purchase approximately 7,000 towers from Millicom in Central America. This immediately accretive transaction positions SBA as the leading power operator in the region with over 10,500 pro form a sites. Beyond just the absolute size and scale, this deal aligns us with one of the leading MNOs in the market under long term U. S. Dollar nominated lease agreements. We also entered into a significant build to suit agreement with Millacom we expect will drive growth, and further improve our position in the region for years to come.

In fact, our 2025 outlook incorporates a planned level of up to 800 new tower builds this year. The largest number for SBA in over twenty years. With the majority of those in Central America. Needless to say, we're excited about this transaction and its contributions to our future growth and stability. Alternatively, we are in a subscale position and don't see a path to scale or other potential limitations on a market future performance, we'll look to exit those markets. Like we did in Argentina back in the fourth quarter of twenty twenty three, we officially exited The Philippines in January. And today, we've also announced we are under agreement to sell our operations in Colombia. Columbia market represents less than 200 sites and the impact to the financials are immaterial. It is not our desire to exit markets. In fact, it is much more our preference to find ways to scale aligning with leading carriers and driving returns. We will continue to look for ways to do just that across our remaining markets. Each of the steps taken over the past year will help our teams be better focused and better positioned to maximize new business opportunities. Looking at 2025 and beyond, the key growth drivers remain intact.

Mobile network consumption continues to grow and limited new spectrum availability means more equipment at the cell site. Fixed wireless access the incorporation of next gen AI applications in handsets, regulatory build out requirements, and remaining five gs coverage expansion are expected to contribute to ongoing network investments. The strength of our balance sheet and the significant free cash flow that we generate every year will allow us to continue investing in high quality new assets. As well as shareholder remuneration through industry leading dividend growth, and share repurchases. We are optimistic about our future opportunities. Before turning it over to Mark, I'd like to thank our team members. The company's ability to achieve our vision to be our customers' first choice provider and the industry leader in quality infrastructure solution is only possible because of the incredibly hardworking team members we have here at SBA SBA. I'd also like to thank our customers for their trust in us and we look forward to collaborating with them to achieve their network goals. With that, I'll now things over to Mark who will provide additional details. Thank you, Brendan. Fourth quarter domestic organic revenue growth over the fourth quarter of last year was 5.1% on a gross basis.

And 2.2% on a net basis including 2.9% of churn. In the quarter, we added approximately $8,500,000 new leases and amendments bings. With respect to the 2.9% of churn, 1.6% was related to Sprint consolidation or approximately $7,000,000 Year over year international organic recurring leasing revenue growth for the fourth quarter which is calculated on a constant currency basis, was 1.7% including 6% of churn or 7.7% on a gross basis. In Brazil, our largest international market, horse organic growth was 8.7% on a constant currency basis. Foreign international churn remained elevated in the fourth quarter to mostly to previously announced key carrier consolidation. In the fourth quarter, consolidated cash site leasing revenue and adjusted EBITDA denominated in U. S. Dollars was 7881% respectively. The majority of non U. S. Dollar denominated revenues from Brazil with Brazil representing 15.6% of consolidated cash site leasing revenues during the quarter. This earnings press release includes our initial 2025 outlook. Domestically, AOCO reflects both the lower level of carrier bookings we experienced in 2024 our expectations for increased activities throughout 2025. We're guiding to a range of $35,000,000 to $39,000,000 for new leasing amendment The outlook also assumes a range of 50% to $52,000,000 related to Sprinter and $22,000,000 of regular churn.

Our previously provided estimate of aggregate spread related churn over the next several years remains largely unchanged. With an estimate of approximately $50,000,000 in 2026 SBA, and approximately $20,000,000 thereafter. [indiscernible] our outlook reflects steady network investment guiding to a range of $16,000,000,000 to $18,000,000,000 for new leases and amendment. The outlook also assumes a range of $27,000,000,000 to $31,000,000 related to churn. Churn continues to be elevated as we work [indiscernible] some carrier bankruptcies or restructurings, [indiscernible] We are working with our current customers to minimize churn over the long term. Additionally, FX continued to be a headwind and we're guiding to a negative $25,000,000 year over year impact from FX on cycling revenue. Turning to services. We're guiding to a range of $160,000,000 to $180,000,000 in revenue reflecting the increased carry activity we are seeing at our [indiscernible] We saw a meaningful increase in activity in the second half of twenty twenty four and we expect to see similar levels throughout 2025. Our total assume an anticipated closing date of September 1 for the previously announced MediComm transaction contributing approximately $42,000,000 cash cycling revenue and $29,000,000 of capital cash flow to our 2025 outlook. The ultimate closing date is dependent upon regulatory approval and other requirements and may differ from these dates.

Please also note that the outlook does not assume any further acquisition beyond those rigs as of today or under contract and expected to close by year end. We also do not assume any share repurchase in our outlook. However, it is possible when investing in additional asset or share repurchase or both during the year. I will now turn the call over to Mark who will provide additional Thanks, Mark. As we previously announced on our third quarter call in October of last year, the company issued through an existing trust two tranches of Tower Revenue Securities for a total of $2,070,000,000 included a tranche of $620,000,000 issued at 4.654% with an anticipated repayment date of October 2027 and a final maturity date of October 2054. We also issued a tranche of $1,450,000,000 issued at 4.831% with anticipated repayment date of October 2029 and a final maturity date of October 2024. Our next maturity is a $750,000,000 ABS note due January 2026. Current leverage is 6.1 times net debt to adjusted EBITDA and fourth quarter net cash interest coverage ratio of adjusted EBITDA to net cash interest expense was very strong to 5.5 times. Our weighted average maturity is approximately three point four years, with an average interest rate of 3.2% across our total outstanding debt.

As of today, our $2,000,000,000 revolver remains fully undrawn. During the fourth quarter, we declared and paid a cash dividend of 105 point or $0.98 per share And today, we announced that our Board of Directors declared a first quarter dividend of $1.11 per share payable on 03/27/2025 SBA, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on March 13. 2025. This dividend represents an increase of approximately 13% over the dividend paid in the fourth quarter of twenty twenty four. And approximately 35% of the midpoint of our full year AFFO And with that operator, we are ready to turn the call over to questions.

Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. As we move on to Q and A, Okay. And let's go ahead and go to our first caller, Batya Aliti from UBS. Great. Thank you. Can you provide a little bit more color on the increase in the backlog that you're seeing right now? Do you see that coming from increased applications from a specific tenant or is it more broad across all your tenants? And maybe some color in terms of how should we think about the book to bill cycle to be with co location increasing? I know you just guided for 5%, but if we assume it's a back end loaded year, is it fair to assume you good visibility for U. S. Leasing to be up next year?

Yes. So the mix in terms of the backlog, I would say, is fairly broad. It's not exactly the same for each carrier. There are certain ones that are perhaps a little busier than others, but generally speaking, they're all up in terms of the applications that are coming in. And there are more as we mentioned in our prepared comments, there definitely are more there's more business coming from new leases relative to amendments to existing leases like we've seen in the past. And so that shift in the mix of the type of new bookings that we're seeing will drive the book to bill cycle to be later and therefore we would expect to see growth quarter over quarter throughout this year in terms of the contributions domestically from new leases and amendments. And so yes, I think that generally speaking would be favorable to next year. It's certainly a little little premature to be talking about what next year's numbers are going to look like. Let's see how this year plays out, but SBA expectation is we'll see growth move up as we move through the year.

Sounds good. Thank you.

Sure. All right. Moving on to our next caller, Jim Schneider, Goldman Sachs. Good afternoon. Thanks for taking my question. With many of your carrier customers in The U. S. Having sort of given a multiyear outlook for CapEx, which is sort of consistent with what the past couple of years. How should we think about your ability to sort of grow domestic leasing in the out years relative to this year's guidance, if those budgets remain where they are? And maybe what are some of the areas that would allow you to sort of outperform those overall CapEx growth envelopes whether it's densification, fixed wireless or otherwise? Yes, Jim. I mean, the carriers obviously have very large CapEx budgets. And so what would probably be relatively minor shifts in the mix or makeup of those CapEx budgets can have a more meaningful impact on us. And so so I'm not too concerned about their overall CapEx budgets being relatively flat. Because what we're seeing on the ground is a lot more activity around their wireless networks and specifically the macro based networks. So as I look out into the future, I can only see what's happening now and what they're telling us today and that suggests a lot more activity.

And I think actually the lack of incremental spectrum being added to the mix means that they have to make sure that what they have stretches farther. And I think that's actually going turn out to be decent for us in terms of their planning in the next couple of years. Thanks. And then Brendan, just a follow-up on that. I believe in your opening script, you mentioned that there you saw demand specifically for fixed wireless capacity additions. Can you maybe clarify whether that is fixed wireless capacity above and beyond or completely separate from conventional mobile capacity or maybe any color on where that is happening would be helpful. Yes. I mean, honestly, it's a little bit hard to distinguish from what we see going on to the sites in terms of basic five gs mobile capacity versus fixed wireless access. But what we're hearing is in our conversations with the carriers on the ground, that that is a meaningful driver of the incremental investment in some of these locations. [indiscernible] I'm giving you, I guess, I would characterize as anecdotal, but we're definitely seeing the increased activity. And so we mentioned that because it is one of the drivers that we hear from our customers as to the the increased investment that they're making.

But I think it's probably an all of the above type of thing ultimately. Great. Thank you.

All right. Before we move on to our next caller, I just want to remind everyone that if you'd like to ask a question, please dial Let's move on to our next caller, Matt Nitnam from Deutsche Bank.

Thanks so much for taking the question. If I could. First, on the leasing outlook for 2025, maybe Brendan, if there's any commentary you can offer up in terms of what's baked in for customer specific activity across the three nationals in DISH? And then secondly on the services outlook, so the guy is for $160,000,000 to $180,000,000 It's a little bit shy of the annualized exit rate from 4Q. If you just annualize the fourth quarter number, it implies closer to 190 so I'm just wondering if there were any one timers in the fourth quarter or if you're assuming any sort of moderation from any customers SBA Sure. Yes. So on the second one first, there's no one timers in the fourth quarter. I think what we're giving you is based on what we have in our backlog today and the conversations we're having with the carriers, the services guidance is a little bit harder to be completely precise on when you look out for the full year at this stage of the year because it's not a long term contract cycle the way it is in the leasing business. So as you get to the second half of the year, we tend to take perhaps a slight bit of conservatism in our approach to the back half of the year.

So I don't think there's anything really that you should read into that Matt. In terms of against the fourth quarter of last year. On the leasing outlook, I mean, we prefer to stay away from too much detail on a customer specific basis. As I mentioned in the answer to a previous question, we're seeing each of the big three carriers increased their activity levels and so they're all contributing to that. We do have contributions from certain carriers that have regulatory obligations for coverage download speed, that are driving big percentage of the activity that we're seeing. So in one particular case, that's the main driver. But really they're all [indiscernible] So I would say among the big three that's the case. And as it relates to DISH, nearly as much as we have in the past, so that's a much lesser contribution. Thank you. Okay. Moving on to Richard Cho, JPMorgan. Hi.

Hi. Just wanted to follow-up on the mix of business. I assume still heavier amendment versus colo, but by the end of the year, do you see that being more even or actually even more COLO?

Yes, it's actually we're actually seeing in terms of dollars [indiscernible] and this is The U. S. We're talking about specifically, but we're seeing greater contribution from colos today. Versus amendments. Historically, it's obviously been amendments predominantly, but that has happened in terms of that shift. At least on a dollar basis, the number of agreements because the amendments are lesser dollars tend to still favor the amendments.

And then you have Sprinter this year and some next year. Is there any positioning in terms of maybe wanting to get that all into this year at some point or is it still just kind of waiting for it to roll off Yes, Richard, I mean, at this stage, most of this year's fringe churn is stuff that's frankly already happened or just about to happen in some cases. And this is the financial impact of it is what's in our numbers for this year. And when you look at next year, which is the last big year, Most of the impacts of that will be driven by leases that expire right towards the end of this year or the beginning of next year. And so there's really not that much time to try and pull something in. And in order to do that, you would expect, I think, that T Mobile would expect some sort of balance in that, but they're something in that for them, if they're going to pay it off early. So The quick answer is, I don't think that's likely to occur in terms of accelerating it. But at this stage, we're down to the final years of the material impact.

So I think everybody knows what it is at this stage. Thank you. [indiscernible] Okay. Moving on to Michael Rollins from Citigroup.

Thanks and good afternoon.

Two questions. First one, if I could follow-up on the last one. As the merger churn is picking up in The U. S, is there a corresponding increase in fees for carriers leading the equipment behind? And is that something that could be a significant contributor whether it's this year or over the next few years as you kind of wrap up some of this merger churn?

And then secondly, just maybe taking a step back on capital allocation. If you can give us an update on how you're thinking about your target debt leverage and the priorities for capital? Thanks.

Sure. On the [indiscernible] There are fees associated with decommissionings or pan walk type of fees But actually a lot of that stuff has been incurred because even though the churn is sort of spread out over this time period in a number of cases the installations have been commissioned already. In fact, actually, if you look at our Well, the other bucket, if you look at our bridge of revenue, you look at the other bucket, domestically, you'll see that it's actually down a bit and that that is one of the contributors is that we've had a decent amount of that kind of contributing to our numbers in the previous years and so it's a little bit less now. Is still going to be more of that because there certainly are sites where there's still continuing to decommission.

The equipment at those sites SBA we typically do that work. But I don't expect it to be something that would be all that meaningful to the results that we And then, on the target debt level going forward, You know what our historical target range has been and we've been well below that target range for quite a while now.

At this stage, I don't see any reason [indiscernible] we will likely shift from the level that we're at sort of at between six and six point five turns of net debt to EBITDA. Leverage. And I say that not because it's our desire to necessarily keep it at that level. It's really about the opportunities for the investment of capital. And I think if we see meaningful investment opportunities of size and we needed to lever up a little bit to accomplish those investments, then we will be comfortable doing that. But as I sit here today and knowing that we can fully handle the Millicom deal, that we're closing on later this year, I think it's a reasonable expectation that we'll probably be somewhere below 6.5 times as we get to the end of the year. That's what's implied in our current numbers. That we guided to.

Thanks.

Sure.

All right. Our next caller, Rick Prentiss from Raymond James.

Thanks, everybody.

Are you doing?

Hey, good, Rick. How are you? Good. Thanks. I want to follow-up on Michael's question a little bit further. Where do you think leverage needs to be investment grade?

You guys don't have a lot of final purchase options.

Could you be investment grade kind of in the 6%, six point five percent and six 6.5x range? Yes. Well, based on where the agencies have indicated us and it's actually out there publicly as the breakpoints. I do believe that we could be investment grade certainly with at least one of the agencies and I think with both at that the level that we're at today, it's really more of a commitment as to our intent to stay there or to go lower. And I we're frankly not yet ready to make that commitment. But at some point, that will be the natural course for things and it will happen. I just think it's a little premature to do that today. And frankly, I'm not sure that we get much benefit from doing it right now. Particularly on a cost of debt basis, it would be very small to give up the flexibility I think is more valuable right now. Right. Of course, sometimes they let you flex up as long as you commit to bring it back down.

The Millicom transaction, remind us how much turns of leverage that should be putting on as we look at closing the deal in September and what it means kind of leverage next year. Yes. I mean, by itself, it puts on about 0.2 turns of leverage, so very, very small.

And obviously, depending on what we're doing [indiscernible] that may or may not even show up as we get to the end of the year. So it When you're producing $1,300,000,000 or $1,400,000,000 of AFFO, We can absorb actually a lot and not really move our leverage. One more strategic question.

And then one kind of out there question, but when you think about AI, you touched on in your opening remarks, when and how will AI affect powers? We've seen it obviously affecting data centers, but will AI benefit towers and how so and when?

Well, if I could answer that, there's explicitly as I'd like to, that would be good.

It's hard to say for sure, Rick, is honest answer, we are We do believe that there certainly will be a positive impact as we mentioned in the prepared comments when you as you see these generative AI functionality embedded into the handsets, and that's really because it's a driver of incremental usage and incremental network capacity that we expect will actually be taken up as a result of those solutions. So it's not that different from other things that have been introduced in the past that have driven [indiscernible] use of the network So that broadly is very good for us. Obviously, there are AI benefits within our own business that we're introducing every day and continue to evaluate here to become more efficient, provide better information to our customers. That we think could drive leasing. That kind of thing. But in terms of something more explicit than that. I think there could be, but I think it's a little too early to know for sure.

Makes sense. Appreciate it. Thanks guys. [indiscernible] All right. Moving on to Simon Flannery from Morgan Stanley.

To Millicom, you talked about a September 1 close. Can you just update us on where the deal timelines are? What's the sort sensitivity? Is that going to be you have good line of sight to that Could it be earlier? Could it be later? Might it close in stages?

And then, Mark, you talked about the Sprint churn. Could you just give us a little bit of update on the international churn 'twenty six and beyond, what you're seeing remaining from OE and some of the other consolidation? Thanks.

Yes. So on the milli comm, closing dates, we gave you what, we consider our best guest. At September 1, it There's a lot of different factors that are potentially going to contribute to the timing of that. It definitely could be a different time than that. I mean, honestly, it's our desire and frankly, it's Millicom's desire to close earlier or at least close parts of it earlier. And if we can do that, we will do that because it's it's additive. And We'd both like to get going here, but there are certain regulatory hurdles that need to be cleared and other diligence items and certain other things that need to get addressed. So we pegged it at September 1 for purposes of issuing the outlook and obviously if it closes earlier or parts of it close earlier, we'll update our outlook as we move through the year if that happens. I don't expect that it would close later. Certainly possible, but I think that's unlikely. And then the international churn, There's a mix of things going on there. I mean, unfortunately, most of the [indiscernible] that's in our outlook internationally is in Brazil.

And I would say, unfortunately, it's a little bit higher than we probably would have thought before. It's largely built around the oil consolidation it's not necessarily just the direct consolidation, it's also all the steps that the carriers are taking going through that process, the surviving carriers taking to rationalize their networks and deal with other focus areas. And so so there as you would imagine trying to be as efficient as they can. And we're trying to help them through that in a way that is balanced for us too, but it it is pulling forward, I would say, some turn that we probably thought would have been spread out over a little bit longer period of time. And then beyond that, it's a lot of different cats and dogs and different markets. The next biggest thing outside of Brazil on [indiscernible] the Claro Liberty consolidation. So we have those things that are still going on. But as I think that runs down see that improve. And actually, it'll be good for these markets as it will stabilize the markets.

Our next caller is Nick Del Deo from MoffettNathanson.

Hey, guys. With respect to services, you've got one customer that's historically been much larger than the others. I guess, are you seeing any diversification of services work in 2025 versus 2024? Broadly similar I would say we're seeing increases across the board, but that that one big customer is increasing quite a bit as well. So I'm not sure that the mix is going to change all that much.

We're still pretty heavily concentrated. And a lot of that just is based on agreements that exist with some of the other carriers with turfing vendors and things like that.

And we continue to work with them because I think I believe in my opinion that they would all agree that, when we do the work for them, we do it as well as anybody in the industry. And so we're seeing more and more of a preference to use us, particularly on our own sites. There's a lot of advantages for the carriers. But it has to be profitable work for us too. And so that balance makes it a little bit more challenging. But my as is one of our internal goals next that you're touching on to diversify our revenue base in that business, because I think it's important to do. And I think it's something we can accomplish. Okay.

That's good to hear. [indiscernible] Brendan, you had mentioned a step up in the rate of new builds in 2025.

You share anything about the kind of initial development yields that you're expecting with those builds Should we think of the change in the cadence as basically being attributable to Millicom as opposed to other factors?

Yes. I mean, the Millicom deal is definitely a big driver of that. It's by far the biggest driver of that. I mean, we've got I mentioned in the script that we had approximately 800 new builds we expect to do this year. That's what's implied in our outlook and in the discretionary CapEx.

Most of that say ballpark close to 500, it would be Central America as part of the Millicom deal. So that's definitely the biggest driver, but there are other markets as well. Tanzania is another market where we're building a lot of sites. So it's concentrated in certain markets. But the ones that we're doing are very good. We feel really good about the yields on those day one. They don't require a ton of lease up, but I do think there's a lot of good opportunity for lease up. In a number of these situations. So it's a positive contributor and I think will help our our return on invested capital that we report as we start to get into them and get them done.

Okay, great. Thanks.

Sure. Our next caller is David Barden from Bank of America.

Hey, guys. Thanks so much for taking the questions. So [indiscernible] been a vocal proponent of kind of changing the bead program to incorporate a little bit more flexible technological approaches to achieving some of these broadband goals? And fixed wireless access has been one of them. This has been a question we've been dealing with on the other side of the equation, which is how does it affect the wireline providers? I'm interested to hear your perspective on to the extent that anyone has been phoning in asking SBA can you help me figure out a way address fixed wireless access as as a bead solution? That'd be one question. And then second question is, Another big question that's kind of arisen subsequent to DISH kind of refinancing itself and getting $5,000,000,000 in capital, question was what were they going to do with that money? Were they going to use it to invest in handsets, and marketing, were they going to try to get to their build out requirements SBA obviously that build out requirement extension that they just got from the Rosenmersel FCC is under threat and I'm interested to know if there's some change in the conversation around How DISH might factor into your thinking in tower demand for the next couple of years?

Thank you. [indiscernible] Okay.

Well, there's a lot there, dude. On the no, no, that's all right. On the bead program, I guess the short answer is no. I've not we've not really heard much from folks who are looking to us to try and help them. With fixed wireless access as a beat solution.

Per se. What we are As I think well, in my opinion, and I think others would agree with this, that it was obviously a very fiber oriented program. And I think expanding it out to to cover more than just fiber to consider wireless as a solution is a good thing and we would be very supportive of that. So I do think that it could be good if in fact it goes that direction.

But it's It feels a little early on that. And there's been it's pretty far down the road in terms of a lot of the money being out the door and what the plans are. So I'm not sure how much of an impact we'll see from SBA, but I'm I have some little bit of little glimmer of hope that it is a favorable contributor for us SBA we certainly are supportive of that.

On the DISH side, When I think about the impact to us over the coming years, I think I mentioned in response to an earlier question that we don't expect a whole lot of contribution this year and that's that's really because we're just not seeing that much from them. They've been much quieter.

I think that they have a lot to do and when we have conversations with our network folks, it sounds like they have a lot of plans around that. But I think the extra time that they [indiscernible] these build outs are just giving them the sense that they can take a little bit more time and If it's under threat and that's changed I guess we'll see what that does. If that in fact is the case, I'm not sure about that. But at this stage, It's pretty it's pretty slow with them. So we'll see and we're hopeful that it'll pick up. We have a very good relationship with them. We have a lot of existing embedded leases And I think there's a lot that we can do together. As soon as they kind of get clarity on their plans over the next couple of years.

All right.

All right. Up next is Ari Klein from BMO Capital Markets.

Thank you. And just going back to the international churn, curious if the level you're expecting in 2025, do you think that going to be the peak And do we need to kind of move past the churn you're seeing to kind of see leasing start to accelerate in international markets or could they kind of the separate from one another?

Yes. I mean, unfortunately, Ari, I don't actually think it's the peak. I don't think it's necessarily going to be higher, but I do think that next year is likely going to be at a similar level to this year in terms of international turn. But its impact in terms of organic growth overall, obviously, it weighs on SBA, but there is Different markets have different dynamics right now going on. I mean, we've got a lot happening.

In Central America and in [indiscernible] and Tanzania specifically.

And I think we will see, not only a lot of newbuild activity like we're working on, but we will actually see reasonably good lease up in those markets. And in many cases, particularly in Central America, we're Pretty much through the churn, the consolidation churn, a lot of it has happened at this point.

And so, we'll start to see that pullback. It's really Brazil, which is we're obviously heavily indexed to Brazil.

So as Brazil goes, that kind of is a fighting factor for a lot of these things and I think Brazil probably has another year beyond this year at least, we're things will be a little bit challenging on that front. Thanks. And then just maybe on share repurchases. How should we think about that? Are those likely to be on hold until the Novacom deal is completed or is it kind of independent of that and how you're thinking about it? Yes, I'd say it's somewhat independent of it. Obviously, we know that we have that commitment that we have approximately $1,000,000,000 of capital that we are obligated to payout. And as I mentioned earlier, the timing of that hopefully will be earlier than what we put forth. That's what we're shooting for if we can make it happen. And if it is earlier, that means we have to have that ready and available, which we do, but it does influence our thinking a little bit. However, having said that, we typically have run our share buyback program and I expect it to be the same for the time being. In a somewhat opportunistic manner. And so if we don't see other things going on and we see an opportunity where we think there's a meaningful dislocation that happens that doesn't make any sense to us.

We may react more quickly to that. Moving on to Brendan Lynch from Barclays.

Great. Thanks for taking my question. Another follow-up on the government policy. Can you talk about the potential for more spectrum auctions over the next couple of years? And if you're having any conversations with customers on how that would inform their intentions and how you can support them?

Obviously, that's one of the things that's being talked about by the new FCC that we are extremely favorable on and are very supportive of as of course, are the wireless MNOs here in The U. S. SBA so I am hopeful that we will actually see an acceleration to improve the likelihood of having more spectrum auctioned off. Having said that, even if that is the case, with the current delay that's taken place SBA the time it will take to get to that and then ultimately for it to be cleared and available for deployment, you're talking a number of years off into the future. And so conversations that we have with our customers are less about what they'll need to do with potential new spectrum years from now. It's more about how do they optimize and maximize what they have today that they either still have to deploy or that they can maybe redesign a little bit in order to maximize what they're able to produce with the current holdings. So that's the more immediate thing and that's the type of thing that we would discuss rather than around future auctions at this stage. Sure. That makes sense.

Another issue, you're selling the portfolio in Colombia. Should we expect you to exit additional markets throughout this year or is that process pretty much complete at this point?

No, I mean, it's not our intention. To necessarily exit additional markets. In fact, as I mentioned, I think in my comments, we much prefer to not do that and to find ways towards improved scale and better positioning with the leading carriers in those markets. So that that's what we're focused on. But having said that, in some cases like we did in Colombia and like we did in The Philippines, if we come to the conclusion that we don't see a reasonable viable path to getting there anytime soon, then for purposes of being focused with our operations and where we are spending our We would consider it but it's not currently something that we have in the hopper.

Great. Thank you for the color.

Sure.

All right. That was our last caller in All right.

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