Q4 2020 American Tower Corp Earnings Call

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Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by welcome to the <unk>.

American tower fourth quarter and full year 2020 earnings Conference call. As a reminder, today's conference call is being recorded following the prepared remarks, we will open the call for questions.

I'd like to ask a question. Please press one net zero I would now like to turn the call over to your host eager Kozlowski Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead Sir.

Good morning, and thank you for joining American towers fourth quarter and full year 2020 earnings conference call.

We've posted a presentation, which we will refer to throughout our prepared remarks under the Investor Relations tab of our website.

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Our agenda for this morning's call will be as follows.

First I'll quickly summarize our financial results for the quarter and full year 2020.

Next Tom Bartlett, our president and CEO will provide a strategic update on our long term growth trajectory.

And finally, Rod Smith, our executive Vice President CFO, and Treasurer will discuss our toy 'twenty results in 2021 outlook.

After these comments, we will open up the call for your questions.

Before I begin I'll remind you that this call will contain forward looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties.

Ample of these statements include our expectations regarding future growth, including our 'twenty 'twenty, one outlook capital allocation and future operating performance.

Our expectations regarding the impacts of COVID-19.

Our expectations regarding the impacts of the AGR decision in India.

Our expectations regarding our pending telsey as transaction.

And any other statements regarding matters that are not historical fact.

You should be aware that certain factors may affect us in the future and could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in these forward looking statements.

Such factors include the risk factors set forth in this morning's earnings press release, those set forth in our form 10-K for the year ended December 31 2019.

As updated in our form 10-Q for the three months ended March 31 2020.

And in other filings, we make with the SEC.

We urge you to consider these factors and remind you that we undertake no obligation to update the information contained in this call to reflect subsequent events or circumstances.

Now please turn to slide four of our presentation, which highlights our financial results for our fourth quarter and full year 2020.

During the quarter, our property revenue increased 10% to $2 1 billion.

Our adjusted EBITDA grew by 13% to nearly $1 4 billion.

And our consolidated <unk> and consolidated <unk> per share increased by $8, nine and eight 8%, respectively to $936 million and $2.10.

On an FX neutral basis growth rates for property revenue adjusted EBITDA and consolidated <unk> per share would have been $13 415.9, and 11, 9% respectively.

Finally, net income attributable to American Tower Corporation common stock holders decreased by roughly 35% to 365 million or <unk> 82 cents per diluted common share.

The decrease included the impacts of approximately $181 million and impairment charges in the quarter across several markets as well as the non recurrence of certain income tax benefits in India from 2019.

From a full year perspective, our property revenue increased six 5% to nearly $8 billion.

Our adjusted EBITDA grew by eight 7% to approximately $5 2 billion.

And our consolidated <unk> and consolidated <unk> per share increased by seven six and seven 5%, respectively to nearly $3 8 billion and $8 49.

On an FX neutral basis full year growth rates for property revenue adjusted EBITDA and consolidated <unk> per share would have been 10, 812.3, and 11, 6% respectively.

Finally, net income attributable to American Tower Corporation common stockholders decreased by about 10, 4% to $1 7 billion or $3 79 per diluted common share.

Again impacted by the impairment charges in the fourth quarter and the non recurrence of certain income tax benefits in India from 2019.

And with that I'll turn the call over to Tom.

Thanks, Igor and good morning, everyone.

As you saw from our posted results. We finished 2020 with another strong quarter and a solid momentum heading into 2021 globally. The secular trends in mobile that we've leveraged to deliver sustainable long term growth are firmly intact as.

Is advancing mobile technology modernizes economies transforms the lives of billions of people and connects us during an unprecedented pandemic.

Our extensive communications real estate portfolio is well positioned to serve as a fundamental backbone of today and Tomorrow's modern wireless networks and we're excited about our path forward.

But before I get into our future expectations I want to first briefly summarize our last five years of performance and highlight the key drivers of those results as a form of a backdrop, what we expect going forward.

Turning to slide six of our presentation you can see that from 2015 to 2020, we generated an 11% CAGR for consolidated property revenue adjusted EBITDA and consolidated <unk> per share.

These results were supported by attractive organic tenant billings growth rates, which averaged 6% in the U S and 7% internationally.

Additionally over the last five years, we have meaningfully enhanced our global Newbuild program, creating a platform that enabled us to construct nearly 5900 sites. Just this past year and almost 17000 sites since the start of 2016, our focus on new site construction together with our proven disciplined.

<unk> M&A strategy has resulted in the addition of nearly 100000 new sites over the last five years further lifting our returns and growth trajectory.

Currently we grew our annual common stock dividend by more than 150% from $1 81 per share in 2015 to $4 53 per share in 2020, adding another attractive element to our total return formula.

The consistency of our performance over these last five years speaks to the fact that our stand and deliver strategy is working.

The four pillars of this strategy operational efficiency growing our assets and capabilities extending our platform and driving industry leadership have continued to pay dividends across our global asset base.

We firmly believe that the continued implementation of these strategic priorities will result in sustainable long term growth generation and that remains our focus and.

In other words, while we are obviously mindful of and realize the importance of our quarterly numbers. The way we run the company is fundamentally designed to optimize returns over a much longer planning horizon, and we believe our results speak for themselves.

This philosophy is evidenced by among other things our strategic long term contracts such as the T. Mobile agreement that we signed in September and.

In the immediate term that deal will result in some elevated churn.

But over the longer term, we expect it to create tremendous value for our stockholders, while helping to secure a significant share of industry leasing activity in our sites and supporting the deployment of fiber across the country.

Our recently announced <unk> transaction is another good example of our stand and deliver construct inaction.

Our financial strength proven capital allocation strategy and objective of gaining scale in the most attractive markets globally enabled us to identify what we believe to be a unique opportunity for long term value creation in Europe and overall as we expand our global platform.

As is typical with our investments. This transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to consolidated <unk> per share.

However, most of the accretion and shareholder value will be realized over time as we generate Lisa construct additional sites to round out the portfolio and drive higher margins.

Additional future upside may come we believe from our platform expansion initiatives, particularly in markets like Germany, where we anticipate that edge computing will be important for carriers and enterprise accounts themselves as they see the benefits of five G.

And the ability to be in a unique position to be able to provide a global platform of well over 200000 sites in over 20 countries pro forma for Chelsea as the global <unk> Hyperscale enterprise accounts and datacenter companies should drive additional value over time.

Our standard delivered commitment also drives our focus on industry leadership, particularly in the area of ESG, including among other things our increasing use of renewable energy reduction of our emissions and numerous human capital initiatives designed to ensure that we remain as non.

Not only a preferred employer, but also a positive driving force in our communities.

This was particularly relevant this past year as we enhanced our commitments to diversity throughout the company committed funds to help counter social injustice and structural in equities and so additional opportunities to make a positive impact including initiatives to help bridge the digital divide through programs like our digital village.

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Our culture at American Tower is extremely important to me personally as well as the rest of our executive team.

And while we clearly have more to do I am proud of the tremendous strides we've all made together over the last few years.

Looking forward, we expect our continued execution of stand and deliver to result in similarly attractive long term sustainable growth for American tower and compelling total returns for our stockholders.

Moving to slide seven you can see that the U S and Canada organic tenant billings growth will continue to be a critical component of our long term success at.

Having said that as I just mentioned, we will have elevated levels of U S churn beginning in the fourth quarter of this year and particularly in 2022, which will result in average U S organic tenant billings growth rates of around 2% across the next two years. This is due to the legacy sprint network being.

And truly decommission by T mobile and the fact that unlike our peers, we have been able to limit iden related churn to date as a result of previous master lease agreements adjusted.

Adjusted to exclude these cancellations are expected U S organic tenant billings growth through 2022 would average around 5%.

As part of that growth, we expect our gross new business commencements to accelerate beyond 2020 levels, given the deployment of new technology, new spectrum and new market entrants.

What's even more interesting for us in line with our focus on long term growth.

The organic trajectory beginning in 2023 as.

As you can see in this slide from 2023 through 2027, we expect organic tenant billings growth to accelerate to on average at least 5% on a reported basis and at least 6% excluding the impacts of the remaining legacy sprint churn.

Importantly, much of this growth is contractual in part driven by escalators on existing leases, which will continue to average more than 3% per year and in part represented by future New business that we have locked in through contractual frameworks like our agreement with T mobile.

Said another way the majority of our expected baseline future organic growth in the United States through 2027 is contractually guaranteed two day.

This is further supported by our expectations that churn in the U S will be lower than historical levels. Once the legacy sprint leases fully roll off in 2024.

The non contractually guaranteed components of these projections are based on the assumption that annual wireless capex in the U S will be slightly higher than current levels through 2027 is five <unk> deployments take hold and as new spectrum like C band is deployed.

This in many ways mirrors, what has occurred in the past with new technology, Rollouts, where capex levels have risen with each new G.

We continue to believe that the carriers have a mandate to deploy <unk> as quickly as possible given it is the most cost effective way for them to address the tremendous growing levels of mobile data traffic streaming across their networks.

As a result, we expect to see meaningful incremental Densification and amendment activity further foreseeable future driving strong growth.

Importantly, we have not layered in any material assumptions around a potential new entrant outside of dish and we have assumed only modest contributions from edge computing and other platform expansion initiatives within these numbers we.

We are working diligently to unearth additional meaningful opportunities that can drive further upside to our growth rates.

Turning to slide eight we are also reiterating our aspirational goal of delivering average annual double digit consolidated <unk> per share growth for the next seven years, including initial guidance of around eight 5% growth for 2021, we.

We expect the U S organic growth I, just referenced two to be an important component of our <unk> trajectory.

In addition, similar to what we have seen in the past our expectation is for international organic tenant billings growth rates to be at least 200 basis points higher than the U S. Over the long term further enhancing our consolidated <unk> per share growth.

Many of our international markets are in earlier stages of technology to development had little to no fixed line penetration and require tremendous incremental investment in their wireless network infrastructure to support future Densification.

The criticality of wireless in these locations has been further highlighted during the ongoing pandemic.

As you have the limitations of current network infrastructure as a result, we expect that as carriers ramp their network investments are emerging market organic growth rates will continue to be very attractive.

Meanwhile, in more advanced markets like Germany. We are now seeing early stages of <unk> build outs, which we believe will result in a long pathway of attractive growth as well importantly.

Importantly, we expect organic growth in Germany to accelerate meaningfully over the next several years.

Furthermore, we expect recent and future M&A together with our accelerating Newbuild program to drive additional value.

This includes our pending <unk> deal several recently closed transactions in the United States as well as the nearly 5900 sites. We constructed in 2020 and a roughly 6500 sites, we expect to build in 2021 and.

In fact based upon the demand we're seeing for new sites across our international business. We are targeting the construction of 40 to 50000, new towers over the next five years with day, one NOI yields continuing to be extremely attractive.

And on the M&A side, we expect there to be numerous additional opportunities for us to deploy capital towards high quality assets with attractive counterparties and favorable economics.

As in the past, we expect M&A to be a key piece of our future growth story.

Enhancing operational efficiency another pillar of stand and deliver will also be a key area for us as we seek to drive continued double digit growth and consolidated <unk> per share.

As we incrementally globalize the business, we are creating shared service centers optimizing various back office processes sharpening our pencils on site level services like energy provision and focusing resources on further enhancing and improving our customers' experience with us.

Utilizing drone technology and our interest in Colo initiatives are examples of how we are both scaling more efficiently and increasing the value proposition for our customers.

We remain laser focused on driving margin improvement throughout the business, which should translate into continued high conversion rates of adjusted EBITDA to consolidated <unk>.

And finally, we continue to believe that our leading investment grade balance sheet is a key differentiator for the company and expect that it will be an important component in achieving double digit consolidated <unk> per share growth.

The investment grade debt markets remain extremely attractive from both a rate and access perspective.

And we feel good about our ability to not only complete value additive refinancing transactions, but also to fund accretive M&A in the future.

We remain fully committed to our investment grade credit rating and expect it to be an important element of our future success.

In conclusion, we believe that we are exceptionally well positioned to extend our long track record of driving strong growth and attractive returns, particularly at a point in time when mobile broadband connectivity globally has never been more critical.

We have tremendous visibility into our future baseline growth trajectory, including having roughly $59 billion in contractually committed revenues supported by long term mutually beneficial comprehensive master lease agreements with key tenants.

Also expect to have some interesting opportunities to further enhance that baseline through platform expansion initiatives like edge computing power as a service and other potential sources of upside.

Moreover, we believe that our unmatched geographic diversification of distributed sites has the potential to set us apart from the competition, particularly in the context of an increasingly global tenant base cross border infrastructure deployments and an even more connected and digitally driven world.

We firmly believe we have the right strategy the right macro tower oriented asset base and the right management team to move American tower forward into the <unk> era and beyond.

With that let me turn the call over to Rob to go through our 2020 results and the details of our 2021 outlook.

Rod.

Thanks, Tom and good morning, everyone I Hope you and your families are all doing well as you can see from our press release and presentation. We had another solid year and finish 2020 on a high note posting another strong quarter of performance across our global business. This included constructing a record number of high return new sites complete.

<unk>, two sizeable and accretive acquisitions in the U S strengthening our already strong balance sheet and achieving higher than previously expected consolidated <unk> per share growth.

Our mission critical tower portfolio.

The ability to execute across our global footprint disciplined reliable and proven approach to capital allocation and strong balance sheet all position us to achieve the long term predictable growth that Tom referenced earlier.

As part of that growth path, we expect to have a strong year in 2021, but before I get into the details of our 2021 expectations I'll spend a few minutes on our financial results for the quarter and the full year 2020.

As you can see on slide 10, we reached double digit growth in property revenue adjusted EBITDA and consolidated <unk> in the fourth quarter on an FX neutral basis.

Our fourth quarter consolidated property revenue of $2 1 billion grew on a reported basis by $191 million.

Or 10% over the prior year period, and on an FX neutral basis by $256 million or 13, 4%.

We generated consolidated organic tenant billings growth of four 4%, including 4% in the U S and five 2% in our international markets led by Africa at nine 4% in Latin America at more than 7%.

As expected U S organic tenant billings growth pulled back a bit in Q4, due primarily to the flow through impact of slower activity levels earlier in the year.

Meanwhile, in international markets, we completed the construction of approximately 2900, new sites, which nearly doubled the previous American Tower Records set in Q3 of 2020.

Adjusted EBITDA growth was 13% in the quarter with adjusted EBITDA margins up by over 150 basis points year over year due to organic growth cost controls and straight line benefits. Finally, we translated that strong adjusted EBITDA growth to solid consolidated <unk> and consolidated <unk>.

<unk> per share growth of nearly 9% or about 12% on a currency neutral basis.

On slide 11, you can see that our full year consolidated property revenue growth was six 5%, including organic tenant billings growth of four 8% and total tenant billings growth of nine 7%.

In total we outpaced our initial property revenue outlook on a currency neutral basis by more than $130 million, our organic tenant billings growth included four 5% in volume growth from Colocation and amendment activity with another three 3% generated through escalators churn was just under 3%.

And there was a negative 10 basis point impact from other items for the year, we commenced over $19 million in growth new monthly business with nearly $10 million of that in the U S.

Our U S and Canada property revenue grew nearly 8% supported by organic tenant billings growth of four 6% contribution to tenant billings from new assets of less than 1% and approximately $135 million in higher straight line revenue.

With respect to organic tenant billings growth volume growth from co locations and amendments contributed three 5% for the full year growth rate while pricing.

<unk> escalators contributed three 2% this was partially offset by churn of about one 7% and a negative impact of roughly 30 basis points from other items. Our international property revenue grew by nearly 5% or by around 14, 5% on a currency neutral basis as meaningful net work capital was again.

Deployed globally by large multinational tenants.

International organic tenant billings growth was five 1% with Colocation and amendment revenue driving six 5% growth while escalators contributed nearly three 6%.

Other run rate items added 20 basis points, while churn concentrated in India was just over 5%.

Finally, the day, one revenue associated with the more than 23000 sites. We've added through M&A in our Newbuild programs over the last two years contributed nearly 5% to our global tenant billings growth. This includes the impact of our nearly 5900, new builds in 2020, which generated average.

<unk> NOI yields of over 12%.

Moving to slide 12 for the year adjusted EBITDA grew by nearly 9% with adjusted EBITDA margin, increasing to 64, 1% a year over year expansion of over 150 basis points. This increase was primarily driven by strong underlying revenue growth net straight line benefits and continuing cost efficiencies throughout the.

Our business on an FX neutral basis, we exceeded our initial 2020 outlook for adjusted EBITDA by around $150 million. These.

These adjusted EBITDA results included continuing progress in fuel management, particularly in Africa, where we've reduced our diesel usage by more than 45 million liters in 2020.

As of the end of the year, we had more than 7000 sites with lithium ion batteries and over 3000 with solar.

We also grew consolidated <unk> and consolidated <unk> per share by nearly 8% in 2020 as a result of our previously discussed growth in cash adjusted EBITDA.

This growth was also supported by our disciplined capital market strategy, we avoided the credit market disruption caused by COVID-19 between March and May while taking full advantage of improved conditions. Thereafter in fact, despite closing over $9 billion in M&A since the start of 2019, we were able to reduce our cash.

Interest expense by approximately $40 million maintenance capex by more than $10 million and kept cash taxes flat 2020 versus 2019.

On a currency neutral basis, these strategic efforts and effective management of our cost structure facilitated consolidated <unk> per share growth of roughly 11, 6% exceeding our initial expectations for the year by more than 23 per share.

Now, let's take a look at our expectations for 2021.

Before we dig into the numbers I'd like to summarize a few of the key high level assumptions surrounding our projections.

First both in the U S and in our international markets, We expect gross new business additions to our recurring monthly run rate to be above 2020 levels. This is due to a mix of contractually committed revenue growth, particularly in the U S and continued solid demand for tower space internationally cash.

<unk> are expected to deploy new technologies, and new spectrum will densify their networks to keep up with rapidly growing mobile data usage around the world.

We expect churn to be somewhat elevated this year due to a combination of T mobile lease cancellations in the U S primarily in the fourth quarter and hold over churn in India.

In the U S. We expect net churn will be just over 3% for the full year, including six 5% in Q4, specifically this includes schedules cancellations as part of our agreement with T. Mobile some legacy sprint and Clearwire churn outside of the MLA in normal course cancellations of around 2%.

Of the roughly $375 million in total annualized legacy sprint churn that we expect over the next four years more than 50% or just under $200 million, we'll hit our run rate in 2021 with the vast majority churning off October one.

Given this is an annualized number we will incur a quarter of the impact in 2021 with three quarters of it coming in 2022.

In India, we expect churn to be roughly 11% in 2021, which is down about 3% versus 2020, but still higher than historical levels.

Similar to 2020. This churn is primarily being driven by holdover consolidation impacts in the effects of the AGR case, we continue to work closely with the Indian wireless carriers as they plan for the future and are optimistic net churn rates in India will continue to trend down over the next several years.

Finally, I would note that we've excluded the impacts of our pending <unk> transaction and its associated financings from our outlook per historical practice, we continue to expect the deal to close in multiple tranches beginning late in the second quarter and we'll plan to layer on the deal impact into the future outlook update.

As a reminder, we expect healthiest assets to be immediately accretive to consolidated <unk> per share.

Taking these assumptions into account as you can see on slide 13, we expect consolidated property revenue to grow by nearly 8% at the midpoint of our outlook supported by solid overall levels of organic new business and contributions from new assets.

Our U S and Canada property revenue is expected to grow by 8% with anticipated international property revenue growth of seven 5%, including an approximately 1% positive impact from foreign currency translation.

We expect organic new business to again be a critical component of our overall growth in 2021 and on a consolidated basis, our outlook assumes more than $23 million of growth new business monthly run rate added across our tower and das assets in 2021 up.

Up about 20% as compared to 2020.

Turning to slide 14 in the U S and Canada, we are projecting organic tenant billings growth of around 3% and five deployments continue to gather steam and network Densification efforts progressed on a gross basis, we expect monthly new business run rate added in 2021 to exceed what we add.

Added in 2020 by more than 15% however.

However, we will see elevated churn from T mobile beginning in Q4, and we will also see some carryover effects from slower activity levels in 2020, particularly earlier in the year.

These items is expected churn of nearly 3% in the region due primarily to a settlement agreement, we reached with Brazil related to legacy Nextel leases and some telefonica churn in Mexico in the second half of the year.

On the inorganic side, we expect to further accelerate our Newbuild program anticipate constructing around 600 sites a year over year increase of almost 50%.

Incorporating contributions from these new sites, we expect Latin America tenant buildings to grow by around seven 5% for the full year.

Meanwhile, in Africa, 2021, organic tenants billings growth is expected to be more than 8%. We anticipate gross new business monthly run rate added to be up roughly 70% year over year with Nigeria, leading the way in terms of higher activity levels.

Especially offsetting this or escalators that we anticipate will be around 70 basis points lower than last year and churn of about 3% up about 140 basis points first 2020.

The escalators are largely a function of local CPI, while the slightly elevated churn primarily reflects from carrier consolidation in South Africa.

We also expect another year of significant Newbuild activity in Africa with one 300, new builds plan for 2021 in total we expect to drive tenant billings growth of more than 13% in the region.

In Europe, we expect organic Kenneth billings growth of over 3% in 2021 up from two 2% in 2020.

The acceleration is being driven by the combination of higher levels of expected new business and slightly lower churn as carriers advanced their network deployments, we're starting to see some of the growth that drives our optimism around the telsey its assets in our existing European business Germany's growth organic tenant billings growth in queue for.

Of 2020, with nearly 7% and is expected to continue at that level into 2021 with.

With further acceleration anticipating in future years.

Finally in India, we expect organic tenants billings growth to be roughly flat in 2021 broadly similar to what we saw in 2020.

While we believe the wireless industry consolidation process is essentially complete there remain some uncertainty with respect to the exact path forward post AGR as a result, our outlook for 2021 incorporates the expectation that we will again see higher than historical levels of churn. In addition, while new.

<unk> run rate added from new businesses expect to be slightly up first 2020 due to the activity being mostly in the second half of the year. It will not fully impact our organic growth in 2021 as a result, although we expect churn to be 11% down from nearly 14% in 2020 overall or.

Panic tenant billings growth is projected to be similar.

Long term, we remain optimistic with respect to our India business. There is a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done to bring networks across the country up to <unk> standards in our portfolio is well positioned to capture that activity from a structure perspective, we think there is a path to an eventual return to high typical.

Organic tenant billings growth rates in the high single digits.

What is less clear is the specific timing of that growth acceleration, which will depend on a number of factors in the marketplace as we learn more and as the trajectory becomes clear we will plan to keep you all updated.

Turning to slide 15 at the mid point of our outlook, we expect adjusted EBITDA to grow by almost $485 million or nearly 95%. This includes continued high margin flow through over again, a growth as well as the impacts of accretive emanate transactions completed in 2020, along with built to suit activity and Ah.

Full year of our recent MLA agreement with T mobile.

In addition, we expect to target areas in our business, where we can take additional efficiencies, including power fuel, where we are continuing to invest in more efficient equipment and renewable energy solutions are cash SG&A expenses of percent of total property revenue is expected to be around seven 3% down from just over.

8% in 2020, and we anticipate further reductions in the future finally, our adjusted EBITDA expectations include an estimated positive impact of around $27 million from the effects of FX translation.

Moving to the next slide we expect to convert our adjusted EBITDA growth into year over year growth and consolidated <unk> of around $322 million or eight 5%. This includes $358 million from FX neutral cash adjusted EBITDA growth benefits from lower cash interest costs due to the <unk>.

Refinancing initiatives.

And about $23 million and favorable translational FX impacts par.

Partially offsetting these items as a $62 million increase in FX neutral cash taxes versus the prior year as well as a slight increase in total maintenance capex on a per share basis, we expect consolidated <unk> growth to be nearly eight 5% for the year setting the stage for us to achieve double digit.

Per share growth, if we drive some outperformance vs current expectations.

Moving on to Slide 17, Let's review our capital deployment in 2020, and our expectations for 2021.

In 2020, we deployed about $2 billion for our dividend, while spending roughly $1.1 billion on capex with more than 85% of that being discretionary.

Part of that discretionary spend was to build nearly 5900 sites throughout our global footprint, a new record for American tower, we spent around five $5 billion, including the assumption of that to acquire new assets, an additional steaks, and our Africa and India businesses from JV partners and we also dedicated above.

$56 million to buy that.

In total we deployed nearly $9 billion in 2020, a record year for American tower, while staying within our leverage targets and simultaneously strengthening the balance sheet.

We again expect to deploy capital in a consistent balanced manner. In 2021. This includes one $4 billion committed to Capex again, largely discretionary in about $2.3 billion allocated towards our dividend, assuming a growth rate of around 15% and subject to board approval.

Included in our discretionary Capex spend is the expected construction of 6500, new sites worldwide, an increase of more than 600 sites compared to 2020.

Day, one NOI yields on these bills are expected to continue to average more than 10% and new builds capex remains as our highest return investment with solid anchor tenant credit quality.

In addition, and as I will talk more than a minute, we expect to close our pending <unk> acquisition. This year for total consideration of about nine $4 billion.

Including this transaction, we expect it roughly 90% of our total capital deployment in 2021 will be an investment grade rated geography's with investment grade carriers.

As you can see on the right side of the slide are disciplined to capital allocation strategy, coupled with solid operational execution and a strong balance sheet has enabled us to drive consistent reoccurring long term growth and consolidated air flow per share and we expect more of the same this year and.

Fact in 2021, we expect our 2020 investments in new builds an M&A to generate around 15 cents, an incremental consolidated <unk> per share. We continue to believe that both consolidated F. A full per share growth and attractive returns on invested capital are critical to our creation of long.

<unk> term sustainable stockholder value.

Now turning to slide 18, how will discuss our financing plans for the pending Celsius acquisition.

As a reminder, this transaction is transformational for our European business as it deliver significant scale in key markets is expected to drive some of the highest organic attendant billings growth rates available in the region and based on our analysis represents the best portfolio a tower assets that has come to market in Europe.

The total consideration will be approximately nine $4 billion and we anticipate completing the purchase in 2021 through multiple closings. We expect the first closing to consist of a large portion of the European assets in late Q too with the remaining assets in Europe, and Latin America closing in late Q3.

Of course this timeline may shift is the regulatory process unfolds as.

As we communicated when we announced the deal we planned to finance the transaction in a manner consistent with maintaining our investment great credit rating. We anticipate this will include bringing our net leverage which stood at five times at the end of 2020 up to the high five times range temporarily importantly, we are committed to organically deals.

Bring back down to a level consistent with our standard financial policy of three to five times net leverage over a multiyear period.

On the that funding front, we expect to utilize the combination of our recently upsized revolving credit facilities and new Euro denominated term loans and plan to Opportunistically consider long term sources, including senior unsecured notes.

The balance of the total consideration is expected to be funded with equity, which may include common stock issuances mandatory convertible preferred instruments and or private capital raised through the sale of minority Stakes of our European subsidiary to one or more private investment partners.

From the private capital side. We are currently engaged in discussions with a select group of Premier strategic investors, who not only can provide capital, but also have considerable experience in telecommunications infrastructure and in the European region specifically.

We are encouraged by our progress on this front and if terms are sufficiently attractive are optimistic that we can complement a public equity issuance with a high quality strategic private capital rays as always through this process, we remain disciplined and focused on minimizing dilution to our common stockholders.

While optimizing our long term value creation objectives.

On slide 19, and in summary, 2020 was a very strong resilient ear for American tower with solid organic growth operational efficiencies, providing high conversion rates record newbuild activity accretive M&A and continued value creation for our shareholders. Looking forward. We are excited about the long term.

Potential of our business, our comprehensive portfolio is well positioned to capture meaningful Lisa as new spectrum assets and new network technologies are deployed globally in the U S activity is ramping up and we expect to continue to create significant value through the master lease agreements with key tenants.

We stand ready to quickly integrate the new Telsey us assets this year and leverage our expanded European presence for significant future growth, which will complement our operations in other less mature markets taking into account continued strong tailwind from secular growth trends in mobile we expect to be able to deliver attractive so.

Stable growth in revenues and cash flows for years to come while driving compelling total stockholder returns.

And with that operator will you. Please open the line for questions.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, if you'd like to ask you. A question. Please press 190 on your telephone keypad you may withdraw your question at any time by repeating non one zero command, if you're using a speaker phone. Please pick up the handset before pressing the numbers. Once again, if you have a question. Please press one zero at this time and one moment. Please for your first question.

Your first question comes from a line of breath Feldman. Please go ahead.

Yes. Thank you for taking the question in just a few about the outlet provided for domestic organic tenants billings growth.

First you mentioned that you do expect that growth activity is likely to increase from here one of your peers outlined to view that that will begin in the second half of this year I am wondering if that's the same assumption you've embedded in your outlook I'm also curious how sensitive your outlook is to that I think at this point you haven't MLA with all of your major Cussed.

Immersion so perhaps the variability here is narrower and then just on Shurn I think you suggested and non sprint churn was going to be in the two per cent range. This year, which is a bit above trend I'm wondering if there's anything I need to focus on and then I believe T. Mobile has indicated and they're gonna be shutting down the spring CDMA network I think starting next.

<unk> is that captured in your churn assumptions as well thank you.

Thanks, Brett So I'll take that this is rod Smith. Thanks for the question. So with regards to R. U S organic tenant buildings growth as we roll into 2021 Uhm, Let me get a couple of the component drivers that will be that will be factors, including the new business. So as you saw in the presentation.

We expect to have.

Organic tenant billings growth of around 3% for 2021, that's down from about four 6% in 2020, there's a few factors driving that the first one is that our monthly run rate new Bill is anticipated to increase by about 15% year.

Year over year. So that's that's kind of kind of drive some growth there in our organic tenants billings growth that obviously is being offset by a couple of factors. One is as you mentioned the sprint churn. So we do expect to begin to sprint churn in Q3 of 2021 and as you saw in the presentations and some of our prepared remarks, where.

Are expecting over the next four years to have about $375 million of annualized sprint churn. The vast majority of that ends up coming in in the beginning.

Beginning in the fourth quarter of 2021, so we'll see churned begin in the fourth quarter that'll represent about $200 million of annualized run right that'll begin to come off or come off in queue. In Q4 of 2020 that has a drag on organic billing throughout the lowest 100 basis points that explains a big chunk of that step.

Down between year over year. The next piece that I would highlight is the activity levels coming out of 2020. So everyone knows there was kind of a slowdown from T mobile and spread in 2020 began in 2019 and went into 2020 that slowdown has flow threw up back into 2021, which all.

So impact our growth rate.

And that is going to impact the beginning of the year. The first half of the year more than the second half of the year. So that's why we consistent with what you may have heard from some other folks and then the final piece of fish the size of our base is getting bigger and that usually brings downgrowth by about 20 bps. So we have that as well and then I would the final point I would make them you're getting tenant billings growth is.

R. R organic Kennedy billings growth is not that sensitive to the timing of activity need in other network decommissioning out because it's mostly made up of of contracts that have minimum levels of activity in pre defined churn reductions in those sorts of things. So there's not a lot of variability.

An hour numbers.

From that perspective, and then in terms of the spring I guess I address the sprint churn numbers. So.

So I think that that property dresses that part of your question breath.

Okay. There was there anything outside of spring share and it sounded like that might be a little higher. This year was a short that was one a one shot deal or somebody else. Yeah. No I think the way you framed it up is correct. So we expect churn normal sure to be within that 1% to 2% range pretty consistent nothing abnormal there and then the sprint churn again that begins in queue for.

We'll have about 100 basis point hit so when you think about that all in our annual churn will be in the range of three per cent a little bit of Bob what are normal ranges and again as you see the quarters on cold in 2021, the fourth quarter will be where you'll see the kind of that big bump up in the churn numbers and then of course that goodwill will take one quarter of that in 2000.

21, and then there'll be flow through effects from that turn into 2022, where will he get three quarters of that churn in 2022 and that of course, we will have a flow through negative impact on of 2022 growth numbers.

But the one that is correct yes.

And growth New business day is accelerating as we head into 2021, and we expect that to continue into 2022.

Really the churn that'll partially or fully offset that in 2021 or 2022.

Okay got it and just to be clear all of this came over related is currently to churn. It captures everything you expect them to do with the integration, including anything Youre doing the CD Amanda CDMA network that is correct. That's correct Yep, it's all predefined and contracted.

They can actually bred I I I I would just add as as I mentioned before you know when we get through this churn because.

And then we had this really locked in a kind of growth rates with our customers. We would expect the current really to fall off quite a bit.

Significantly actually kind of the 23 to 2020 427 kind of time frame, which is reflected in the some of the growth rates. It did I laid out for a long term perspective.

Thank you.

Your next question comes from the line of Michael Rowan's. Please go ahead.

Thanks, and good morning, if I could just briefly follow up on a comment that you just made.

Talked about the committees growth that you would have with key customers. You also talked about that earlier in the call.

When you're talking about.

572023 of 2027 growth. So are there additional longterm deals that you recently renewed or entered into with carriers other than T. Mobile that is contributing to that visibility and to that long term guidance.

And then just secondly.

I'm from one of the questions. That's come up is how does you know think about AFL per share growth.

When you are experiencing the peak churn from the sprint deal in 2022 is there anything that investors should be mindful of as you're looking for that long term target you described but coming out of 21 and into twenty-two with that.

Elevated sprint churn.

Thank you and the team we're just describing.

Yeah, No hey, Michael Thanks for the questions with regards to your first comment I mean, there are no new MLA that I mean, we already have Emily and plays with the major carriers. So there's nothing else that that's driving that which I think is what your question was.

The most significant MLA that we've recently made it was clearly with with T mobile and so that's what's really impacting if you will and and as I as I mentioned over two thirds of over the the planning period that we're talking about two thirds of our growth rates are locked in and.

So we have a tremendous visibility in terms of what that's going to look like and as I mentioned, we are 59 or $60 billion already contractually committed a revenue on the books. So that gives us I think some really good.

Comfort in terms of what we would expect on top of that we will also have the the large chelsea's.

Transaction that will.

Kicking his rideshare throughout the year and so we'll have that benefit continuing forward, which kind of gets into your second question. We've looked at as I mentioned.

And my comments or the last five years, we're talking about double digit growth rates in terms of Arab whole per share I'm compensated candidly on the bulk on a day before.

Oh per share growth as well as return on invested capital. So those are two critical benchmarks for myself and my team.

So we obviously spend a lot of time working through all of the elements of those in 2022, yeah. There is going to be the the trough of the the T mobile churn that we're going to see we know what it is we're working on you know opportunities now to be able to mitigate.

<unk> a lot of that as we go into 2022, we put out an initial guide for 2021, I've got 8.5% level.

We are all hoping that we're gonna be able to improve on that for 2021, particularly as we bring on the kind of the Telsey as transaction and then we were working through what 2022 will look like but clearly are committed to driving that double digit F O per share growth over the the long period of time.

As we've done in the past and so we've had historically consolidations going on as you know we've had.

Consolidation shirt in India over the past.

No doubt that the the T. Mobile Spring chart is a large item for us that we need to address but our teams are working on diligently right now and.

And we're trying to work through that and but clearly we are committed to driving that double digit kind of growth.

Thanks, and just one other quick follow up Rod when you were talking about the eh, it's still per share expectation for growth in 2021, you refer to the possibility of upside opportunities are those operational financial in nature, what would be the factors.

And there's a line on the Sly to talk about the potential path to double digit growth if upside opportunities.

Initial outlook materialized. Thanks.

Yeah, Michael I think there's a lot of there's a lot of additional opportunities. There are certainly some of our operational driving down expenses, bringing up our margins. We continue to kind of work on that on a regular basis. There are potential for additional acquisitions as well as integrating acquisitions that we've already announced particularly the <unk>.

Site transaction, then it's healthiest to drive additional growth capital markets activity and where rates go can certainly it'll be interesting to us as we continue to pay down higher.

Cost that and replace it with lower costs that those sorts of things as well as driving business through new business around the globe certainly could.

Could help so there's a number of things.

And and we always remained focused on trying to drive upside relative to our plans and outlook. So we'll just continue to do that.

Thank you.

Your next question comes from the line of Rick Prentice. Please go ahead.

Good morning, guys and I Hope you continue.

Morning reverse I appreciate all the details short term long term guidance really help set the table here as far as what we're looking at I think a couple of extra questions from.

First.

You mentioned.

This is fairly modest as far as in the 21 guidance what should we think about would you be able to get your fair share of dish leases with or without an MLA.

Yes.

Next question [laughter] pretty clear, Yeah, and I would also confirm let that no I hate <unk> I mean, I I don't.

I don't I don't mean to be white Guy Yeah, we have I mean, if you take a look at it over the last several years, particularly in the United States.

Gain more than our fair share of a business from from our customers in it I. It it's a function a number of things and it's also a function of the contracts that we have in place with them I like to think it's also a function of the level of service that we're providing and and the quality assets that we have but we have been able to to demonstrate.

<unk> that kind of outperformance and we stand ready to support dish and however, there are gonna be rolling up your network and we know that we know the teams well, there's they're smart team day.

May I was smart guys smart operator, and we're working very closely with them and and so we're looking forward to it and and as I said I'd kind of given the location and given the the quality assets I am confident that we will gain at least our fair share of activity from from dish.

Great and I'm thinking that will tear them or she also mentioned that you've not later than any new entrant decide dish is that an allusion to maybe cable operators starting to deploy some C. B R S or or what might dot com and also important.

You know it it kind of covers the waterfront right I mean, it who who knows I mean, yes, clearly whether they're our cable kozar some of those it might be looking to move off of some of their M. B and O as we see that happening in other markets, we see that happening in Germany. For example, whenever you know has a strong relationship with telefonica is going to be looking to.

To to build out their network and in Germany. So, it's so hard to say who might be looking to do that I think with the with the deployment and the new technology.

Who knows even the weather, the hyperscale or is or who who might else be coming into the to the marketplace wouldn't wouldn't surprise me and I don't think it would surprise you either so it's kind of a blanket statement. We just don't know what we don't know relative to other players coming into the market. So we haven't included them clearly in in any of our forecast.

Okay, and speaking of and be those in Germany, any thoughts about timing to get some agreements in place with a holistic approach in Germany, given the new portfolio, particularly the rooftops you're going.

Yeah, we've been we've been working with all of the players in the market for several years, obviously and and most recently since we have a new potential enter it in into the market just as with every other one of our customers working very closely I think that the the assets that we now have the presence that we now have in Germany gives us a really good platform.

To be able to support this existing M. A.

A new build and in Germany, and and I think it's Roger you know, we're really excited about some of the organic growth that we expect.

See in the region and particularly in Germany, as they've just gotten through there if I G. Spectrums N as we see new entrants coming into the marketplace and and now you know with the presence that we have there, particularly with the rooftops. We now have that dense urban area covered which we didn't have before.

So I think it really positions as well to be able to capture new business.

Makes sense last one from is.

<unk> edge assumption when does edge become real it was at 10, a time out at the same in the U S. As it is in Europe in other markets.

Well I I clearly see it advancing in the United States first but candidly I I almost see the opportunity for it to be even greater outside of the United States and and that's where I think that the.

Pro forma for Kelly is Celsius, where it you know 220000 sides. We're looking to build 40 to 50000 more sites over the next several years, we have a massive global platform wreck, which I think is really going to be puts us in a in a really unique spot to be able to offer that global platform.

Two hyperscale datacenter company, even global M N O's, who who are looking for that kind of a ubiquitous tied type of a of a capability and and so you know that's what we're looking and trying to build here uhm.

This is not a 2021 real big revenue opportunity you know I think it's going to take a few years, but we have mou's in place with.

Several companies in the United States working with them on different kind of value propositions different type of market entries, we have proof of concepts that were being we're dropping in front of the the the major <unk> and so we're very excited on it about it we're <unk>, we're spending a lot of think time working through this and working with.

Potential partners. This is not something that we would be looking to bring entirely on our own. So I do see this is a an opportunity to be partnering with a number of other players to bring it I think that even in our own market in the United States and our portfolio you know they'll probably four or 5000 site.

We've identified where we think that we can bring in several shelters into a into a site being able to offer up.

20 to 30 cabs with with 100 to 300, 400 kilowatts of power and and so I think if it were uniquely positioned to be able to do this not just in the United States, but but globally, but I do think it'll it'll be you know start in the United States, but as I said I think our global reach really puts us in a unique position to be able to offer a.

Hi value prop to potential customers.

That's great. Thanks, guys stay well look forward to when we can see you again in person absolutely wrecked you too.

Yeah same thanks, Rick.

Your next question comes from the line of Simon Flannery. Please go ahead.

Alright. Thank you very much <unk> could you just talk a little bit more about the balance of the sprint churn you said 200 window in October one the other 175 to have clarity on when that uhm peels off have stopped in twenty-two twenty-three any specifics around that would be great and then Tom maybe just come back to India. If you could.

But you know talking about pricing transfer to capital raising them the ability to it might be move past and returned to you know more normal growth in 22 and beyond.

Yeah sure Rodway you start out at all.

Second one.

Yeah. It sounds good so good morning, Simon Uhm until the spring churn is expected to be around $375 million. That's an annualized number as I stated in the prepared remarks, and then the last the last Q&A, we expect about $200 million that annualized number or about 53 per cent of row rohloff in Q4 of 2021 the balance will.

Be spread across 2022, 23, and 24 and and I guess in broad percentage of saying you can think about 15 per cent of that total 375 rolling off in 2022, an additional 13 per cent coming off in 2023.

19 per cent coming off in 2024, and then that'll be the end of the spring term.

Okay, Great. That's helpful. Thank you.

And then set you know Simon on India.

Right said and I alluded to as well we continue to to remain.

Positive on the market overall, it's a work in progress as you well know we're looking at growth.

Gross growth in the market a double digit the challenges the church and and it's coming down on a year over year basis, and we will it will continue to come down and that's what we need to be working on with our our carriers, particularly Vodafone in the in the region and and we are working on that day.

As as we speak and so I over and over the longer period of time, I would expect that churned to be coming down and for us to be early be able to start to drive and the positive net organic growth. I mean, you can take a look at our overall international markets, we're going 79 per cent No Latin America.

In Africa.

Europe.

As I mentioned before and with with brick we really see some some nice growth I think we're gonna be experiencing there. So it is indeed I did that focus on that particular market.

But we need to drive that will bring up the overall clearly the growth rate in the in an international space and there are a number of things that they'd have to happen in the marketplace, which we see happening. They just don't happen very quickly you know.

Clearly the the government is committed to.

Two digital India to their digital India program I think the pandemic has made that even more obvious because you know so many Indians. There are looking for telehealth services and they need that broadband connection. So you know everything that we're hearing or seeing is is really giving me even more and more comfort.

That that the government is going to be supporting.

The the carriers to really being able to identify the overall networking and we're seeing that we're seeing at the build programs clearly we're seeing that from from all of the the three major carriers in the marketplace. We're starting to see price increases in in the market, which I think is possible early Paul positive.

We're also seeing our our customers and particularly Vodafone you know looking to identify different areas to be able to infuse capital. I also just saw yesterday from an a G. R perspective that the government is now where you're looking at some of the new calculations that the day the carriers were.

Being opposed on that they were going to have to pay over the next 10 years or so so again I think that's just indicative of the fact that the the the government very much once you know each and every one of the carriers to survive and to participate to their own digitization, that's going on within within the marketplace, but yeah. We got more work to do we got to work.

Through the the contracts that we have in place, particularly with Vodafone to to try to nip the Oh some of that churn, but as I said, we're seeing the growth.

In the marketplace, which I think is is what we've always seen as that opportunity and so now we need to work on that the churn which is exactly what we're doing.

Great. Thanks, Tom.

Sure sign.

Your next question comes from the line of David Barton. Please go ahead.

Hey, guys. Thanks, so much for taking that question I guess.

Tom It it wasn't too long ago that you know the same store sales organic growth rate domestically was six per cent and the belief that the international market would grow to 4% premium to that you know at a 10 and now we have kind of a seven year outlook, which thank you for that for.

The U S to grow at four and for the international market to grow two per cent more than that so now it's at six.

And I guess the the question then becomes.

Two questions. One can you just aggregate that six per cent grows into organic growth.

Inflation based escalators and new builds.

Relative to the U S and then can you disaggregated.

Regionally with respect to you know, which regions are gonna be driving more than six and I guess to your <unk>. Your answer dishonest question is now you know maybe India's on the on the lower end of that six if that population is correct. Thank you so much.

Okay, Hey, David well. Thank you for that question I'll, Let me, let me take a I'll start it and then I'm sure ride, an an ego or it might be able to fill in some of the pieces, but it's I talked about it I mean to be you're you're you're right. We talked about kind of a six to eight per cent kind of growth rain can tell on a consolidated basis right.

If you if you go back a number of years now.

Or twice the size of business that we were back then so growth on a base of that size does get to be a little bit more challenging, but if you can take a look at the numbers day laid out for the U S. Now. This is just organic right and so it's not does not include the our bill to suit programs in the United States.

You know the big the Big item there is this for insurance.

And so that's why we kind of laid it out looking at the next couple of years and then even layering in on top of Okay. What would that growth look like perhaps without that sprint churn and that's where it goes next couple of years being on average in the United States organically a couple of per cent, but being up in that five per cent range to the extent that we did not have it and then you.

[noise] go out longer term 23 to 27 in the United States, where it would be greater or equal to five per cent and then without a greater equal to six per cent. So it's kind of getting back and and particularly if you didn't weigh in the.

The fact that the businesses so much a bigger.

Getting back to those ranges and and you know and.

And we're looking at some of that growth coming from some of our platform extension issues, but not not in any significant way I mean, it's large from pure organic growth coming from our contractually committed master lease agreements that we have with our with our customers you know on the international side.

We didn't necessarily come out what kind of long term growth projections for them other than saying that you know we would expect it to be a couple of hundred basis points, you know higher than what we're seeing in the United States. So given that.

You would look at you know the twenty-three to twenty-seven kind of average up a net seven eight per cent normalized without the kind of you know without the impact of the churn in the United States. So you know, it's working really rather consistent with some of those growth rates that we laid out several years ago and it and as I.

You said that you.

We do have a a.

Big a much bigger base of a business you know what's also exciting nose is on the bill to suit.

Program, you know what that's driving.

Tens of millions of dollars of new revenue for us each and every year, we do have and I do expect as I mentioned and kind of force sites on adding 40 to 50000, new bill to suits over the next five years, we set records kind of every month every year in terms of the the building of isn't even a double digit NOI. So it's really good return.

Of of capital for Us.

And with good tenants. So it really provides upside to our overall growth rate that we expect going going forward you know with the with the the the Telsey is deal and the heavier European presence, we're getting a little bit more of a presence in even in developed markets and and I would expect as I mentioned I think it was to.

Rick you know that you know.

Six per cent kind of growth rates, you know, we're kind of being expected from my perspective in Germany.

And and I, you know I think that there's really a lot of opportunity. There. So again, just kind of stepping back I don't think they are inconsistent with what we've said in in the past we are bigger business. We did we do have that big sprint turn event, which will impact us over the next couple of years, which is to no one's surprise.

Kicking and really the fourth quarter here, we we talked about that right out of the gate.

The day that being you know churn and that kind of four percentage range. If you will of our of our business and it really did land on that and and I think we've been able to put in place a longterm contract with with T. Mobile who are are really in a very good position from the spectrum perspective, and a build from <unk> perspective, and I think we're gonna be very aggressive.

And and so given the kind of master lease agreement, we have in place with them you know I'm I'm really excited about the kind of your strategic relationship that we have with them to be able to explore new stuff and in new areas of a business.

<unk>.

Got a long rambling answer for free question, what day, but I think it's pretty consistent.

Yeah, Hey, Tom maybe a couple of David maybe I'll just add a couple of quick points day. When you look at the the L E as of the U S organic Kevin billings growth number the normalize for the sprint churn, we say no greater than or equal to 6% between 2023 and 2027, when you get beyond that that big churn event in <unk>.

22.

The high level pieces of that we maintain a three per cent escalator in our business or that's a piece of that six per cent, we expect new business to drive four to five per cent.

In that range and then sure churn outside of sprint would be back down into the between one and two per cent. That's how you get to that six per cent over that 23 to 27 timeframe.

Okay right. Thanks for all day and thanks, a lot I appreciate it.

<unk>.

Your next question comes from the line of Nick They'll deal. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, Thanks for taking my question 888 first one in Europe, and then one in India.

In Europe Orange is talking about trying to get some of the other carriers. It happens all the towers you have to kind of join forces and and kind of create a pan European no carrier control tower co. So maybe you can do what's happened in China now obviously, it a lot to happen for that to be realized but if it did do you feel like that would affect the growth outlook repeal of European markets for independence like you.

<unk>.

No.

By the way are just great customer of ours right now we're doing a lot of business with with them candidly, we've we've seen captives working around the world.

Uhm, including even in the United States back into it back in the day and so we've we've operated and we've seen the results in the the impact show them I think in many in some cases it brings some stability in certain certain respects, but but we wouldn't expect that to to impact a growth rates at all.

Yeah.

Okay. Okay, and then you know in India.

You know an emphasis free over the next decade is going to be new builds which is great to hear a lot of that is gonna take place in India. You've also been decommissioning a lot of sites in India over the last several years I assume sites at her naked when the ground lease came up.

Can you talk about that dynamic at all how many more sites in India. You think are left me decommissioned and when we should start to see you know kind of aggregate tower growth in that market.

You know, we we do we evaluate that every month every year and a lot of it is is a function the consolidation that's gone on in the marketplace over the last several years and so you know what.

When something like that happens we look at the sides, we look at the opportunities to to put new customers on on those sites and we evaluate them over a you know a couple of your period to really gonna get a sense of whether there is an opportunity to lease back up as you said kind of those naked sites and so I would expect that the consolidation sure.

Sure and what's happened in the market probably in the next couple of years to.

You you will see those types of things you can't wait it's relatively overall relatively insignificant to the portfolio overall, but it is part of our just our normal impairment analysis that we go through and and and as you all know at least accounting if not just now the property sales. It's also the land.

Hope that we're evaluating as well given that that's on the balance sheet.

Okay got it and you know maybe you know when when quickie. If I can you know didn't expectation fee, Australia dollar ethics right in your guidance do you have something in the works in that market.

Yeah actually with the recent acquisition of insight, we picked up some land.

It's it's it's immaterial really but oh, okay, yeah, okay yeah.

Yeah, we do now have some presence in.

In Australia.

Okay. Okay, great. Thank you Tom.

Bet.

[noise] [noise] [noise] and one moment. Please for your next question.

Your next question comes from the line of Tim Harangue. Please go ahead.

Well, thanks, guys on the answer phone per share growth of double digit I'm, just having a tough from getting their the last few years have been grown organically more like 70 per cent EBITDA margin spent up like 50 basis points a year your interest expenses and prove 100 basis points, you know, maybe a little bit more even.

And you were talking about slower organic growth going forward I mean, one of the other levers you can hold to get to that type of day. If a full growth I mean do you think the interest expense can continue to improve and it will margin improvement accelerate from here any other color would be very helpful. Thanks.

No I sure can let me keep in mind, who we've had huge F X headwinds right. You know if you even take a look at last year. You know it was like 25 30 cents. So we've had some huge ethics headwinds going on we do have is is ride pointed out some M&A that's gonna be kicking in.

In 2021 with calcium and that will.

Impact part of this year and then kicking largely in terms of 2022 I also have a significant focus on our margin performance, you know and and I think that there are a lot of really interesting opportunities for us to even further standardized.

And globalized some of our of our business and and so I'm hopeful that we can even take our industry, leading margins uhm to new levels and so you'll see even this coming year margin performance is up from last year and so I would continue to expect.

You know margin improvement go going forward and then there's just you know general operating leverage you know that will come and so we taught we I think rod mentioned the the increased flow through from revenue down to a F. F. O. So we're hopeful that that will be a a contributor.

You know and even on our in our balance sheet. We continue to look at ways from a maintenance perspective to to drive down or overall cost of borrowing.

So I do think that there are a number of different leverage there again that we'll be able to to drive that is that is that kind of federally at I can take a look at you know the last 10 years in terms of what we've we've done you know I think our our record kind of speaks for itself in terms of the the underlying growth that we've been experiencing now we're talking longterm does that mean every year.

Is gonna be at that those double digit growth rates, well I hope, so, but you know, but but you can also have challenges from year to year basis, but but I'm very optimistic that we're gonna be able to be able to drive those kinds of growth rates.

And then he can maybe I'm sorry that day.

Good day right you just pulling up.

I'll add a couple of things one quick point here on F X. The FX assumption that we have in that long term plan is to hold the F X rays fairly steady to where they are now you have you had mentioned that we also expect you know rates to stay relatively low over that time period, and I'd remind you day 80 per cent of our dad is fixed so very insulated from you know short term move.

<unk> and rates. We also have additional senior notes that uhm, we can continue to kind of pay down maybe to redeem early and replace them with lower interest rate notes now and in the future assuming rates no stay low. So those are two of the pieces kind of at the at the put to put a finer point on F X in into.

Great.

Oh, that's helpful and thanks for the Guy through 2027 are you implying the <unk> I guess you have major MLA agreements in place through that timeframe for the most part and do these agreements allow C band equipment to be put on the towers without any incremental.

Payments are minimal in from out of the payments any more color around the mla's would be great.

Yeah, I mean, <unk> I think we've said in the past I mean, they do cover through the this this period of time and relative to see band in technology and those types of things Tim I really do try to stay away from I don't Wanna get into the to the weeds on some of that activity, but but to answer. Your other question. Yeah M. M M. A master lease agreements to cover too.

This period. So we have we do have some very good visibility into this and I think is Raj said you know two thirds of the of the underlying growth. There are are things that we actually see within the mla's themselves today.

Okay.

Thank you.

Sure.

Your next question comes from the line of Kobe Cencall. Please go ahead.

Great. Thanks for putting me in.

You had mentioned equity raises.

In that there's a variety of different ways in which you're looking at potentially doing that can you give us a sense of the total size of equity and you're looking to raise to support the the acquisition up Lexis and then secondly.

When you think about your leverage target how much room do you still have left in 2021 for things like buybacks are M&A or should we really kind of pushed those out in terms of the expectations are for 22 and beyond.

Thanks for all day. This is Ron I'll I'll take that and you saw an AD in so I think I'll start just by just reminding everyone. We ended the year with leverage it about five times that is at the at the top of our stated financial policy of three to five times. When it comes to tells me it's been financing the Celsius.

Acquisition of course, we expect to do that in a in a manner that is consistent with maintaining our investment great credit rating. That's always been important to us. It continues to be very important to us and we've been engaged in in a variety of frontier since we announced that deal in terms of preparing some financing. The first thing I would note as we do have that that.

Committed bridge led by Bank of America, and we've gone further and syndicated that so we have that in places a backstop you've also seen us in the in the debt markets here in terms of the bank facilities. We upsize. The couple of our resolve revolvers. We also entered into a new term loan that's euro denominated that's about 1.501.

One 9 billion.

Dollar value. So we've got increased liquidity from that perspective, we did and 2022 with about four and a half billion for almost 4.9 billion of liquidity and these are additive for that the prepare for the closing.

One thing that we are comfortable doing we've been working with the rating agencies, we've been doing a lot of internal analysis, and we're comfortable increasing our leverage to the high five times as and when we close the 30th deal and then we'll we'll be committing to delevering back into within our financial policies over over a couple of your time period. So you will.

C as with higher leverage probably for an extended time period and I'll, let you do the math called in terms of what that might mean in terms of how much will raise from that to actually execute on the southeast transaction. The balance of the purchase price that will remain will look at a number of different equity sources will looking at public equity we're looking at <unk> mandatory can.

<unk> and we're also looking at private capital and we're doing a lot of different analysis.

Around that and we'll make the best decisions for our share holders in terms of maximizing total sales to return maximizing ethical per share growth and and also you know looking to help make sure that we have a really strong balance sheet as we go into the future. So we can continue to grow. So when you think about that one of the things. We've done is we've looked very hot.

<unk> at raising private capital we've done a lot of work day of work continuing to be engaged with just a small number of very large premier investors around the world and we maintain a high level of confidence day that that could be a very attractive vehicle for our share holders. So we're continuing to explore that and we'll we'll make the.

You know the decisions kind of along the way and I would say when you think about private capital we are.

In our analysis and the way we're thinking about it we would be selling minority stakes in our European business, it's not really related to the <unk> transactions specifically, it's the entire European business that we would look to finance potentially by adding some private capital in there and in terms of the next how much private capital versus how much public equity will be made.

He knows decision share over the coming weeks and months as we kind of work through the analysis and get closer to closing.

Does that hid all your points Colby.

Yeah. Thank you.

Right.

Great well, thank you everybody for joining.

Think that'll do it for this morning.

I appreciate you joining everyone.

Ladies and gentlemen.

Ladies and gentlemen that does conclude your conference for today. Thank you for your participation in for using AT&T teleconference. You may now disconnect.

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