Qwest Made Money

Phone+ reports that "Qwest Communications International Inc. reported Tuesday that its fourth quarter 2007 earnings were up 89 percent."

1. Qwest's 4Q Net income is $366 Million on revenue of $3.4B, which is down 1.5%.
2. Bundles are up to 62%! (CLEC's + cable hate that, since bundle means contract)
3. Consumer ARPU Expands by $4 to $55

Year end totals for Dec. 31, 2007

• Operating Revenue $13,778,000
• Operating Expenses $12,022,000
• Net Income (loss) $2,917,000 = normalized to $1.1B, according to its SEC filing.
• Qwest lost about 1M access lines in 2007, a 7% decrease to total 11.5M retail lines.
• Qwest added 238,000 TV subs in 2007 to end with 649,000 - through Qwest’s own ChoiceTV or its partnership with DIRECTV, Inc.
• Qwest ends 2007 with 2.6M Broadband subs, up 500K from 4Q06.

"Total data, Internet and video revenue – which now represents 39 percent of Qwest’s total revenue – grew 8.7% year over year", according to its report.

"The telcom saw a 22 % increase in total broadband subscribers, although subscribership was down to 95,000 from 165,000 during the fourth quarter 2006." BB subs are getting harder to come by.

Much of the income is due to the fact that Qwest spent $739 million less in 2007 than it did in 2006. (It also does count the $300M+ for Nacchio's litigation fees). But now that it is rolling out FTTN, it will have to spend - and that means losses will mount. The company operates with abouta 10% income margin ($366M on $3,400M). That's not a lot of room for error. But it is all just accounting and numbers.

Almost forgot to talk about Debt. Total Liabilities is $22B, of which $13.65B is long-term. Total Annual Revenue is $13.8B (and declining).