Leichtman Research Group recently released the broadband customer statistics for the end of the first quarter of 2020 for the largest cable and telephone companies. Leichtman compiles most of these numbers from the statistics provided to stockholders other than Cox, which is estimated. Leichtman says this group of companies represents 96% of all US landline broadband customers.
The big news is that additions in the first quarter were up nearly 85% over the number of customers added in the fourth quarter of 2019. For the quarter, these large ISPs collectively saw growth that annualizes to 4.8%. This was the biggest quarterly overall subscriber growth since early 2015.
| 3/31/20 | 1Q Change | % Change | 4Q 19 Adds | |
| Comcast | 29,106,000 | 477,000 | 1.7% | 443,000 |
| Charter | 27,246,000 | 582,000 | 2.2% | 339.000 |
| AT&T | 15,315,000 | (74,000) | -0.5% | (186,000) |
| Verizon | 6,982,000 | 26,000 | 0.4% | (5,000) |
| Cox | 5,230,000 | 60,000 | 1.2% | 25,000 |
| CenturyLink | 4,667,000 | (11,000) | -0.2% | (36,000) |
| Altice | 4,237,300 | 50,100 | 1.2% | 7,000 |
| Frontier | 3,480,000 | (33,000) | -0.9% | (55,000) |
| Mediacom | 1,349,000 | 21,000 | 1.6% | 12,000 |
| Windstream | 1,067,300 | 18,000 | 1.7% | 9,300 |
| WOW | 797,600 | 16,100 | 2.1% | 7,600 |
| Cable ONE | 793,000 | 20,000 | 2.6% | 83,862 |
| Consolidated | 786,125 | 1,960 | 0.2% | 14 |
| TDS | 460,000 | 4,800 | 1.1% | 17,500 |
| Atlantic Broadband | 457,233 | 5,770 | 1.3% | 5,326 |
| Cincinnati Bell | 427,500 | 1,800 | 0.4% | 1,600 |
| Total | 102,401,158 | 1,166,530 | 1.2% | 669,788 |
| Total Cable | 69,216,233 | 1,231,970 | 1.8% | 922,788 |
| Total Telco | 33,184,925 | (65,440) | -0.2% | (253,586) |
We know that a lot of the growth was due to COVID-19, which drove employees and students to work from homes. A lot of homes likely purchased broadband for this purpose. These big ISPs also pledged to the FCC that they wouldn’t disconnect customers for non-payment during the pandemic. However, the real impact of that policy won’t show up until the second quarter.
Comcast and Charter continue to dominate the rest of industry, and accounted for 86% of total net growth for the quarter. The large cable companies collectively gained over 922,000 subscribers, which their biggest quarterly growth since 2007. The telcos collectively still lost customers for the quarter, but losses are significantly less than in 2019. The biggest telco loser was AT&T which lost 186,000 customers for the quarter. Frontier continued to lose the biggest percentage of its customer base and lost nearly 1% of its broadband customer base during the quarter.
This growth is impressive, and much of the boost has to be due to an increased need for home broadband. We’ll have to wait until later in the year to see the impact of having over 36 million people file for unemployment and for potentially millions of small businesses to close. There has been a long-running debate in the industry about whether broadband is recession-proof. Arguments can be made that homes out of work will hang onto broadband as long as they can in the hopes it can help them find work. In a few quarters, we’ll find out.
Based on past responses, the FCC will be crediting their “pro market” policies for the increases. (Part dark humor, partly serious since they are grabbing credit for just about any piece of good news. Not quite as bizarre as the “jokes” comparing Ajit to Jesus, but pretty tiresome none the less.)
Yes, most of the ISPs took the FCC pledge to Keep America Connected, but now they want to be reimbursed in the next relief package. What about the concept of shared sacrifice? Tens of thousands of individuals lost their jobs and tens of thousands more have furloughs that significantly impact their income. Those folks have paid dearly, the ISPs can feel a pinch too without us back-filling their pockets.