QS Research · Michael Burry's Scion Capital analyst template · 2006
AMERICAN TOWER CORP /MA/ (AMT)
As of 2026-11-09 · 12/15 boxes filled from SEC filings and market data
Conclusion: PASS
Conviction low · base case +0% · downside -21% · upside +6%
The market is not missing much: at $188.79 AMT trades at 17.6x TTM EV/EBITDA and 26.4x P/E, and applying today's 17.6x to TTM EBITDA of $7.01B gives ~$189/share, or roughly today's price. Section 13's +29% upside used a 21.2x peer multiple; under the template's multiple rule I keep 17.6x and vary EBITDA, so the FY2026 Adjusted EBITDA guidance midpoint gives only ~$199 (+5.5%) and a 15% EBITDA decline gives ~$149 (-21.0%). With $37.58B debt, $7.72B operating leases and 4.9x net leverage, the equity is highly sensitive and the risk/reward is not a deep-value long. I pass; a lower price or evidence of durable >20% EBITDA growth would create the edge.
Key numbers
- Share price: $188.79
- Market cap: $87.55B
- Latest financial period: TTM to Sep 30, 2026
- Revenue (TTM): $11.01B
- EV / EBITDA (TTM): 17.6x
- P/E (TTM): 26.4x
- Price / book: 24.90x
The 15 boxes
- ✓ 1. Long-form business notes
AMT is a REIT that rents space on communications sites: property operations were 97% of total revenues in FY2025, with the balance from U.S. tower services. The asset base is 149,686 communications sites at Dec 31, 2025 (42,224 U.S. & Canada; 32,524 Europe; 47,081 Latin America; 27,857 Africa & APAC) plus 30 operating U.S. data centers, and the economics are long leases (5-10 year initial terms, ~3% U.S. escalators), minimal incremental cost per tenant, roughly 2% churn in FY2025 and over $54 billion of non-cancellable future tenant lease revenue. Between the FY2020 and FY2025 10-Ks the portfolio shrank from 185,641 sites and the segment list changed from six geographic-plus-services segments with a separate Asia-Pacific and Africa to a combined Africa & APAC plus a Data Centers segment, after exiting Australia/India/New Zealand (2024) and South Africa fiber (2025) and adding CoreSite in late 2021. Tenant concentration is high in every region (85% of U.S. & Canada segment revenue from AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon in FY2025).
- ✓ 2. Competitive advantage
The sources describe a site-portfolio business with real stickiness — churn was approximately 2% of tenant billings in FY2025 on long-term leases — but not a brand or licence moat: management lists what wins business as location and capacity, grid/interconnection density, price, quality and speed of service, against named public tower peers plus carrier consortia, private equity-backed tower companies and alternative structures such as rooftops and water towers. The offsetting weaknesses are structural: four customers each supplied 10%-18% of total revenues in FY2025 (T-Mobile 18%, AT&T 17%, Verizon 14%, Telefónica 10%), the company carries $37.2 billion of consolidated debt at 31 Dec 2025 (which management itself flags as a possible competitive disadvantage versus less-leveraged peers), and the data center segment was only 10% of FY2025 revenues and is the less mature business. The XBRL history shows operating income rising from $2.89B (FY2020) to $4.85B (FY2025) and operating cash flow from $3.88B to $5.46B, but its revenue line ($935.9M in FY2025) does not scale with operating income, so no margin or return on capital can be derived from it.
- ✓ 3. 10-Q takeaways
Q3 2026 total revenue rose 2.5% to $2,785M, with property revenue up 4.5% to $2,734M and organic tenant billings growth of 1.1%; Data Centers grew 17% while U.S. & Canada property revenue fell 3%. Property gross margin was 73.5% and Adjusted EBITDA margin 65.8%, but net income fell 14.4% to $781M mainly on $71.5M unrealized equity losses. Cash from operations was $1,393M, capex $407M, free cash flow $986M; AMT repurchased $315M of stock in Q3 and raised its FY2026 property revenue midpoint by $55M. The 10-Q says no material risk-factor changes, though the 2025 10-K diff shows new customer-dispute and data-center risk language.
- ✓ 4. Corporate governance
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 5. Overview of the prior 3 years of 8-K filings
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 6. Other significant filings
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 7. Chronology of significant news and events
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 8. Comparables valuation interpretation
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 9. Insider trading interpretation
Filled; members read this box.
- ○ 10. Earnings-call notes
- ○ 11. Impression of the shareholder letter
- ○ 12. Scuttlebutt overview
- ✓ 13. Valuation and risk/reward summary
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 14. Current price suppression and potential catalysts
Filled; members read this box.
- ✓ 15. Conclusions
The call above.
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