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T-Mobile beats Q4 expectations, ends 2020 with 102 million customers

The carrier added 1.7 million net additions in the fourth quarter, along with 1.6 million postpaid.
Written by Natalie Gagliordi, Contributor

T-Mobile delivered better-than-expected fourth quarter financial results on Thursday, with the wireless carrier touting record postpaid phone net customer additions and progress in post-merger synergies with Sprint.

T-Mobile said Q4 earnings were $750 million, or 60 cents per share, on revenue of $20.3 billion. Wall Street was looking for fourth-quarter earnings of 51 cents a share on revenue of $19.9 billion.

The carrier added 1.7 million net additions in the fourth quarter, along with 1.6 million postpaid. T-Mobile's postpaid churn came in at 1.03%, a slight increase for the company.

For the year, T-Mobile said non-GAAP earnings came to $2.65 per share on revenue of $68.4 billion. Analysts were expecting the company to report fiscal 2020 revenue of $67.7 billion on earnings of $2.70 per share.

By the numbers:

  • The company ended the quarter and fiscal year with 102.1 million customers.
  • For full-year 2020, total net customer additions were 5.6 million, with 5.5 million postpaid.
  • T-Mobile added 824,000 branded postpaid phone net additions in Q4, and 2.2 million for the full year.
  • Branded prepaid additions were 84,000 in Q4.
  • Service revenue in the fourth quarter was $14.2 billion and $50.4 billion in full-year 2020, driven by the Sprint merger.
  • T-Mobile said it covers 280 million people with Extended Range 5G.
  • For 2021, T-Mobile said it plans to add 4 million to 4.7 million branded postpaid net customers. Adjusted EBITDA will be between $26.5 billion and $27 billion.

On its Sprint synergies, the company said it delivered $1.3 billion of synergies in full-year 2020, exceeding its guidance from last quarter. Meanwhile, customer network migrations began in the fourth quarter and more than 4 million have been completed, the carrier said. Once the migrations are complete, T-Mobile will fully decommission and shut down the Sprint network.

"These results show that we're pulling way ahead of the pack on what matters - overall 5G network performance - and executing to stay ahead," said Mike Sievert, CEO of T-Mobile. "2020 was quite simply our best year yet, with our highest ever total postpaid net additions of 5.5 million. Our team delivered – leading the industry on customer growth, while being the only major player to grow profitability as well, with our synergy-backed business model."

Shares of T-Mobile were down just over 1% after hours.

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