What's in Store for Crown Castle Stock This Earnings Season?

Crown Castle Inc. CCI is scheduled to release its first-quarter 2025 results on April 30, after the closing bell. In anticipation of the announcement, industry analysts and investors are eager to assess the company's performance and prospects in the current economic climate.

In the last reported quarter, this Houston, TX-based real estate investment trust’s (REIT) adjusted funds from operations (AFFO) per share missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by 1.1%. Results reflected a decline in total site rental revenues, and services and other revenues year over year.

Over the preceding four quarters, CCI’s AFFO per share surpassed estimates on two occasions and missed in the remaining periods, with the average miss being 0.03%. This is depicted in the graph below:

Crown Castle Inc. Price and EPS Surprise

Crown Castle Inc. price-eps-surprise | Crown Castle Inc. Quote

Let’s see how things have shaped up before this announcement.

Factors to Consider Ahead of CCI’s Results

Crown Castle has an unmatched portfolio of wireless communication infrastructure assets in the United States. As wireless data consumption is expected to increase significantly over the next few years, service providers will likely continue their network expansion and densification efforts to meet this incremental demand.

In March 2025, Crown Castle signed an agreement to sell its Fiber segment, with EQT Active Core Infrastructure fund acquiring the small cell business and Zayo Group Holdings Inc. acquiring the fiber solutions business. The company will receive a cash consideration of $8.5 billion at close. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2026, subject to regulatory approvals and certain closing conditions. The move will result in Crown Castle emerging as a pure-play U.S. tower company.

However, customer concentration remains a concern. Any loss of its customers or consolidation among them is likely to have impacted the company’s top line.

Also, high interest expenses are likely to have been a spoilsport for CCI during the to-be-reported quarter.

Projections for Q1

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for first-quarter revenues is pegged at $1.04 billion, indicating a decrease of 36.6% from the year-ago reported number.

Our estimate for quarterly tower site rental revenues stands at $994.1 million, implying a 6.9% decrease year over year. We estimate tower services and other revenues to decline 3.5% year over year to $44.4 million.

We expect first-quarter 2025 interest expenses and amortization of deferred financing costs to rise 8% year over year.

Crown Castle’s activities in the to-be-reported quarter were inadequate to garner analysts’ confidence. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the quarterly AFFO per share has been revised 16.4% downward to $1.02 over the past month. The figure indicates 40.7% decrease from the prior-year quarter’s reported figure.

What Our Quantitative Model Predicts

Our proven model does not conclusively predict a surprise in terms of AFFO per share for Crown Castle this season. The combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy) or 3 (Hold) increases the chances of an AFFO beat, which is not the case here.

Crown Castle currently has an Earnings ESP of -0.63% and a Zacks Rank of 5 (Strong Sell). You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they’re reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.

Stocks That Warrant a Look

Here are two stocks from the broader REIT industry — Public Storage PSA and Vornado Realty Trust VNO — that you may want to consider, as our model shows that these have the right combination of elements to report a surprise this quarter.

PSA, scheduled to report quarterly numbers on April 30, has an Earnings ESP of +0.22% and a Zacks Rank of 3. You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Vornado is slated to report quarterly numbers on May 5. VNO has an Earnings ESP of +2.03% and carries a Zacks Rank of 3 at present. (See the Zacks Earnings Calendar to stay ahead of market-making news.)

Note: Anything related to earnings presented in this write-up represents funds from operations (FFO), a widely used metric to gauge the performance of REITs.

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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).

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