By Emon Reiser

Crown Castle recorded steep losses tied to the sale of its fiber business in the first quarter.

The Houston-based operator of wireless communications towers on Wednesday swung to a loss of $464 million, or $1.07 a share, compared with a profit of $311 million, or 71 cents in the year-ago quarter. The company said it recorded an $830 million loss tied to discontinuing operations from the sale of its fiber business announced in March, but excluded the impact from its outlook.

Analysts polled by FactSet were expecting per-share earnings of $1.02.

Revenue declined 5% to $1.06 billion for the first quarter, but exceeded analysts' expectations of $1.04 billion. The company reported $1.11 billion in the year-ago quarter. Sales were negatively impacted by a $57 million decline in site rental revenues, mainly driven by Sprint cancellations tied to T-Mobile-Sprint network consolidations from their merger.

Crown Castle maintained its full-year outlook, anticipating site-rental billings between $3.89 billion and $3.92 billion for the year.

Interim Chief Executive Dan Schlanger said the company is anticipating a reduction in its annualized dividend per share to $4.25 in the second quarter.

Crown Castle owns, operates and leases shared communications infrastructure throughout the U.S. and about 90,000 route miles of fiber.

Write to Emon Reiser at emon.reiser@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 30, 2025 17:45 ET (21:45 GMT)

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