T-Mobile misses quarterly revenue estimates as competition bites - Reuters

Feb 1 (Reuters) - T-Mobile US Inc (TMUS.O) missed fourth-quarter gross estimates connected Wednesday contempt adding astir 1 cardinal wireless subscribers, arsenic competitors ramped up their vacation play handset offers to lure customers.

The U.S. wireless bearer has been adding thousands of wireless subscribers lately, acknowledgment to discounts connected smartphones, industry-low program prices and an borderline successful 5G, owing to its $23 cardinal buyout of Sprint Corp. successful 2020.

However, Verizon (T.N) and AT&T (T.N) ramped up their handset offers during the vacation play to pat into increasing request aft the latest iPhone launch, hitting T-Mobile's torrid growth.

The bearer added 927,000 postpaid telephone subscribers successful the 4th quarter, the highest among its peers.

But, its churn rate, which refers to the percent of customers who stopped utilizing the company's services, was besides the highest compared to rivals, astatine 0.92%. By contrast, Verizon reported churn of 0.89% for monthly telephone subscribers portion AT&T's came successful astatine 0.84%.

Moreover, executives person hinted astatine a cool-down successful maturation arsenic request for phones with video-conferencing and premium plans that supported distant enactment fades arsenic offices reopen.

T-Mobile expects to adhd betwixt 5 cardinal and 5.5 cardinal nett monthly-bill paying subscribers successful 2023, compared with the 6.4 cardinal additions it reported successful 2022.

The institution earned $1.18 per stock connected gross of $20.27 cardinal successful the 4th quarter, compared with analysts' mean estimation of $1.10 per stock nett connected gross of $20.60 billion, according to Refinitiv data.

Analysts are besides looking for further commentary connected the company's caller information breach that whitethorn person exposed 37 cardinal postpaid and prepaid accounts. The institution had said it whitethorn incur important costs related to the incidental successful January.

Adjusted nett aft deducting lease revenues is expected to beryllium betwixt $28.7 cardinal and $29.2 cardinal successful 2023, up 10% twelvemonth implicit twelvemonth astatine the mid-point, T-Mobile said.

Shares successful the Bellevue, Washington-based institution fell 0.5% successful premarket trading connected Wednesday.

Reporting by Eva Mathews successful Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli and Mark Porter

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