Citing stronger cable modem subscriptions, Charter Communications reported Q1 revenue of $1.185 billion, an increase of $55 million, or 5%, over the same period in 2003. Some highlights for Q1:
- added 125,200 residential high-speed data (HSD) cable modem customers on a pro forma basis. These additions, together with HSD customer growth over the previous three quarters, drove a 40% increase in HSD revenues on a pro forma basis and a 38% increase on an actual basis, compared to the year ago quarter.
- grew the digital video customer base by 68,800 customers, compared to a loss of 31,500 customers during the year ago period, on a pro forma basis. Charter also improved analog video customer trends with a loss of 8,500 customers during Q1 compared to a loss of 49,000 in the year-ago period, on a pro forma basis.
- capital expenditures increased 83% over the unusually low year ago period to $190 million, primarily driven by higher spending on customer premise equipment resulting from more customer connect activity and increased customer adoption of advanced services, including high definition television and digital video recorder technology. Expenditures on scalable infrastructure related to the deployment of advanced services including video on demand and commercial high-speed data services also increased. In addition, aggressive new build construction expenditures in the first quarter of 2004 more than doubled compared to a year ago.
- Charter reported un-levered free cash flow of $273 million for the first quarter of 2004, compared to un-levered free cash flow of $354 million in the first quarter of 2003. The decline in un-levered free cash flow was a result of increased capital expenditures as previously discussed.
- During Q1, Charter completed the sale of geographically non-strategic cable systems to Atlantic Broadband Finance, LLC for approximately $733 million, subject to post-closing adjustments. Systems divested in these transactions represent approximately 228,500 analog video customers.
- As of 31-March-2004, the company had $18.108 billion of outstanding indebtedness, and $153 million cash on hand.
- Charter Communications reported Q4 revenues of $1.217 billion, an increase of 2% over last year's Q4 revenues of $1.189 billion. Charter reported a net loss of 120,900 analog video customers over the past twelve months and a net gain of 2,100 digital video customers during the year. Charter ended the year with 6,431,300 analog video, 2,671,900 digital video and 1,565,600 high-speed data customers. The Company also ended the year with 24,900 telephony customers, principally in the St. Louis market, an increase of approximately 9% compared to the end of 2002.
