According to Scotiabank’s analysis, Shaw Communications’ Freedom Mobile is expected to have healthy subscriber additions and positive Q4 2019 results.
Following the competitive back-to-school period, the regional carrier “fared well and continues to gain accretive market share,” according to the bank’s telecom analyst Jeff Fan.
Shaw Communications’ Freedom Mobile is set to release its Q4 2019 results on October 25th.
Freedom is expected to have a wireless postpaid churn rate of 1.30 percent for Q4 2019, while it had a churn rate of 1.40 percent in Q4 2018. Churn rate is the rate at which a subscriber leaves a carrier to subscribe to a competitor.
Further, Freedom is expected to have an ARPU growth of one percent in Q4 2019.
Fan explains that “since subsidies are booked through a balance sheet and amortized over the contract against revenue,” there was a short-term negative impact on ARPU growth.
He states that this is not a reflection of re-pricing/overage decline and that ARPU growth is expected to re-accelerate starting in Q2 2020.
Additionally, Freedom is expected to have a wireless average billing per user (ABPU) of $43.30 in Q4 2019, an increase compared to $41.00 in Q4 2018.
The regional carrier is expected to have a postpaid net addition of 75,000, and a prepaid net addition of 5,000 for Q4 2019.
This translates to a wireless subscriber net addition of 80,000 for Q4 2019. In Q4 2018, Freedom had 85,000 in wireless subscriber net additions.
“Overall, we think Freedom Q4/F19 results will show that it fared well in a competitive period, with healthy subscriber adds in postpaid and prepaid, and despite slower ARPU growth, we will see strong service revenue growth at 20 percent,” Fan concludes.
Source: Scotiabank
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