Models
Visible Alpha broker models via S&P Xpressfeed · 19 brokers · 441 line items · freshest revision 2026-07-27.
Charter's broker models describe a business that shrinks and pays. Revenue and EBITDA drift lower through FY-2028, but free cash flow per share climbs from $35.42 to $81.53 as the build spend rolls off and the share count falls. The argument is not the top line, where the models are tightly clustered; it is how fast broadband bleeds, whether mobile earns a real margin, and how much of the cash comes back in buybacks.
Read this consensus as standalone Charter — one broker, and only one, models the Cox transaction
A single broker carries a COX adjustment line — $2.53bn in FY-2026 rising to $4.96bn in FY-2027, plus $1.90bn of associated capex in FY-2027. That is one analyst's view, not a consensus, and every other line on this page is built without it. Coverage also thins as the forecast extends: 17 brokers on FY-2025 EBITDA against 12 on FY-2028.
Modeled as a cash story, not a growth story: FCF per share goes $35.42 to $81.53 as the build rolls off
Capex falls to 14.72% of sales in FY-2028 from 20.96% in FY-2025, almost entirely because line-extension spend falls away. EBITDA never grows in these models, so the cash step-up is a capital-intensity and share-count story rather than an earnings one.
| Line | FY-2025A | FY-2026E | FY-2027E | FY-2028E | YoY | Brokers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| P&L | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Total revenue | $54.91bn | $54.27bn | $53.58bn | $53.52bn | -1.2% | 19 |
| EBITDA | $22.62bn | $22.32bn | $21.84bn | $21.76bn | -1.3% | 19 |
| Capex | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Capital expenditures | $11.51bn | $11.43bn | $9.44bn | $7.87bn | -0.6% | 17 |
| Line extensions- Capex | $4.01bn | $3.14bn | $2.30bn | $1.94bn | -21.6% | 15 |
| CapEx / Sales(%) | 21.0% | 21.1% | 17.6% | 14.7% | +0.1pt | 17 |
| Cash per share | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Free cash flow (FCF) | $4.90bn | $4.87bn | $5.87bn | $7.38bn | -0.7% | 17 |
| Free cash flow (FCF) per share($) | $35.42 | $39.93 | $54.88 | $81.53 | +12.7% | 16 |
| Weighted average shares outstanding, Diluted(M#) | 141.11m Number | 121.88m Number | 106.81m Number | 91.53m Number | -13.6% | 19 |
Key drivers
Passings keep growing while subscribers fall, so modeled penetration slides from 50.98% to 44.49% — the losses read as competitive, not as a footprint problem. Price does no work here: ARPU is $71.19 in FY-2025 against $71.31 in FY-2028.
| Line | FY-2025A | FY-2026E | FY-2027E | FY-2028E | YoY | Brokers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Footprint | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Estimated internet passings(K#) | 58.16m Number | 59.51m Number | 60.73m Number | 61.91m Number | +2.3% | 11 |
| Internet penetration of estimated internet passings(%) | 51.0% | 48.8% | 46.5% | 44.5% | -2.2pt | 15 |
| Subscribers | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Residential net adds - Internet(K#) | -400,052 Number | -607,176 Number | -811,161 Number | -701,680 Number | -51.8% | 17 |
| Residential subscribers - Internet(K#) | 27.63m Number | 27.03m Number | 26.22m Number | 25.52m Number | -2.2% | 17 |
| Price & revenue | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| ARPU - Residential Internet($) | $71.19 | $70.86 | $70.93 | $71.31 | -0.5% | 17 |
| Residential - Internet revenue | $23.79bn | $23.24bn | $22.68bn | $22.21bn | -2.3% | 18 |
Key drivers
| Line | FY-2025A | FY-2026E | FY-2027E | FY-2028E | YoY | Brokers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lines | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Total mobile lines(K#) | 11.87m Number | 13.32m Number | 14.72m Number | 15.96m Number | +12.2% | 13 |
| Mobile lines - net adds(K#) | 1.99m Number | 1.56m Number | 1.39m Number | 1.24m Number | -21.8% | 14 |
| Price | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| ARPU - Residential Mobile lines($) | $29.97 | $30.19 | $30.51 | $30.88 | +0.7% | 11 |
| Revenue & margin | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Residential - Mobile service revenue | $3.80bn | $4.40bn | $4.97bn | $5.54bn | +15.8% | 18 |
| Total mobile revenue | $6.10bn | $6.60bn | $7.25bn | $7.83bn | +8.2% | 6 |
| EBITDA - Total mobile | $425.15m | $736.99m | $991.64m | $1.20bn | +73.3% | 6 |
The real arguments are the buyback pace, mobile's margin, and when the rural build stops
The share-count row flows straight into every per-share figure on this page. The internet net-adds range is skewed by one low outlier rather than a broad split — judge that row on its quartiles.
| Line | Period | Median | Q1–Q3 | Min–max | Brokers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weighted average shares outstanding - Diluted(M#) | FY-2028E | 96.72m Number | 80.46m Number–102.71m Number | 62.37m Number–115.17m Number | 11 |
| EBITDA - Total mobile | FY-2027E | $1.10bn | $774.94m–$1.31bn | $393.82m–$1.38bn | 4 |
| Line extensions- Capex | FY-2027E | $2.10bn | $1.97bn–$2.43bn | $1.38bn–$4.02bn | 11 |
| Residential net adds - Internet(K#) | FY-2027E | -684,000 Number | -723,654 Number–-587,222 Number | -2.31m Number–-513,950 Number | 11 |
| ARPU - Residential Video($) | FY-2028E | $82.92 | $79.68–$84.05 | $74.04–$87.17 | 11 |
Headline P&L consensus, momentum and beat/miss live in the CapIQ tab.