“We are on track to deliver $200 million to $300 million of savings this year from our transformation efforts, and continue to make progress towards achieving our goal of $2 billion to $3 billion of annual cost savings by 2025.”

In context

“venue. These benefits were partially offset by higher marketing expenses in the quarter related to the myPlan launch, as well as a $194 million increase in bad debt year-over-year. Bad debt was relatively flat from the prior quarter, and payment trends remained consistent with recent quarters and pre-pandemic levels. Operating expenses, excluding depreciation and amortization and special items, were down 5.9% year-over-year, primarily due to lower cost of equipment from reduced upgrade volumes. As Hans mentioned, we continue to execute on our cost savings program, including through initiatives within our Verizon Global Services organization. During the quarter, we took actions to rationalize our workforce as we continue to see benefits from rationalizing certain legacy wireline products. We are on track to deliver $200 million to $300 million of savings this year from our transformation efforts, and continue to make progress towards achieving our goal of $2 billion to $3 billion of annual cost savings by 2025. Cashflow from operating activities for the second quarter was $9.7 billion, and for the first half of the year totaled $18 billion, compared to $17.7 billion in the prior year period. The increase continues to be related to working capital improvements associated with lower inventory levels and fewer upgrades, which were offset in part by higher cash income taxes and interest expense. CapEx for the quarter came in at $4.1 billion, which reflects the completion of our $10 billion accelerated C-Band program. Capital spending for the first half of the year totaled $10.1 billion, which was over $400 million less than last year. We continue to expect 2023 capital spending to be within our guidance of $18.25 billion to $19.25 billion. Our peak capital spend is behind us, and we are now at a bu”