“We continue to expect total 2025 capital expenditures to reach approximately $11.5 billion, lower than our original outlook of $12 billion, primarily as a result of some network evolution capital pushed into 2026.”

In context

“t of political advertising. And EBITDA growth in the fourth quarter will be pressured by at least as much as it was in the third quarter, given last year's political advertising strength and the same macro pressures we saw in the third quarter. Turning to net income. We generated $1.1 billion of net income attributable to Charter shareholders in the third quarter compared to $1.3 billion last year, given this quarter's lower adjusted EBITDA and higher other operating expenses, driven by merger and acquisition costs related to the pending Cox transaction and severance costs. Turning to Slide 14. Capital expenditures totaled a bit less than $3.1 billion in the third quarter, nearly $500 million higher than last year's third quarter due to CPE spend timing and higher network evolution spend. We continue to expect total 2025 capital expenditures to reach approximately $11.5 billion, lower than our original outlook of $12 billion, primarily as a result of some network evolution capital pushed into 2026. Despite that push, our goal is to ensure that 2025 is the peak capital year, even if by a small margin. And aside from the network evolution timing variance, our previous commentary on capital outlook on a stand-alone basis remains the same. Further, even including the impact of the Cox transaction and associated integration capital, we expect total combined company capital expenditures to decline in the first full calendar year post close. All of those statements are inclusive of the BEAD spending I mentioned earlier. Turning to free cash flow on Slide 15. Third quarter free cash flow totaled $1.6 billion, in line with prior year, given higher CapEx offset by lower cash taxes and a more favorable change in cable working capital tied to CPE spend, some of which will reverse in 4Q. And we”