Verizon posted a 5 percent year-over-year increase in revenue for the third quarter 2015, for a total operating revenue of $33.2 billion.
Earnings per share hit .99 cents and $1.04 in adjusted earnings per share, up from 89 cents per share in the same quarter last year.
Verizon attributed the growth to its wireless and fios businesses, including the addition of 1.3 million retail postpaid wireless subscribers, 114,000 fios internet additions and 42,000 fios video additions.
Verizon’s wireless division now has a total of 105 million total retail postpaid connections, with 110.8 million total retail connections. Postpaid churn this quarter was at .93 percent, down from 1 percent in the same quarter last year.
“Verizon Wireless posted another quarter of quality connections growth – even better than in the second quarter – while maintaining high customer loyalty and profitability,” said Verizon Chairman and CEO Lowell McAdam. “Meanwhile, fios customer growth also improved from the previous quarter. We expect future revenue growth from mobile over-the-top video, including digital advertising, and the Internet of Things.”
Wireless revenues hit $23.0 billion in the third quarter, an increase of 5.4 percent over last year. Total service revenues declined by 4.1 percent year over year to $17.6 billion.
Verizon’s equipment revenues nearly doubled year over year from $2.5 billion in 2014 to $4.3 billion. The increase was attributed to the success of the carrier’s equipment installment plans. In the third quarter, 5.6 million phones were activated using an installment plan, bringing the number of connections on device payment plans to 19 million.
Devices on installment plans account for nearly a quarter of Verizon’s postpaid phone base, and more than 30 percent of the carrier’s postpaid customers are on unsubsidized phone pricing. Verizon said the percentage of phone activations made on installment plans grew to about 58 percent in the third quarter, up from 49 percent the previous quarter and 12 percent year over year. That figure is expected to increase to nearly 70 percent in the upcoming fourth quarter, Shammo said.
Verizon also saw growth in its 4G device base, adding 889,000 4G smartphones to its postpaid subscriber base in the third quarter. More than 76 percent of Verizon’s retail postpaid connections are on 4G devices, and 89 percent of total data traffic in the third quarter was handled over the carrier’s LTE network, up from 75 percent last year.
During Tuesday’s earnings call, Shammo revealed Verizon is aiming to deploy its newly acquired AWS-3 spectrum within a 2017-2018 timeframe but said VoLTE-only handsets could hit the market as soon as the end of 2016.
Verizon’s stock was up .25 percent on the news Tuesday morning, with shares trading at $44.81.
