Megacable Hldgs Sab Ord

Good morning and welcome to Megacable's fourth quarter 2023 earnings conference call. With us this morning from Megacable, we have Mr. Enrique Yamuni, CEO, Mr. Raymundo Fernandez, Deputy CEO, and Mr. Luis Setter, CFO. Let me remind you that the information discussed in today's earnings call may include forward-looking statements on the company's future financial performance and prospects, which are subjects to risks and uncertainties. Megacable undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements. I will now turn the call over to Mr. Enrique Yamuni. Sir, you may begin.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. Once again, during this period, we achieved strong operating and financial performance, supported by the successful execution of our special projects. After the sales strategy adjustments, we are returning to the subscriber growth trend of previous periods. Supported by greater penetration in expansion cities, while legacy territories continue to grow despite a competitive market in that line, in 2023, we recorded the highest annual net additions of broadband and unique subscribers in the company's history. As we have mentioned before, our expansion plan was conceived with two main strategies. First, the building of the infrastructure, which would bring 8 to 9 million additional homes to the 9.3 million homes that we had when we announced this initiative, using state-of-the-art fiber technology and entering into approximately 60 new cities. And second, to gradually increase the penetration rates to levels of 20% the objective that we have set. This will result in the subscriber increase that will generate additional revenues. As of December 2023, we are very satisfied with this year's significant achievements in both strategies. as we have far exceeded the initial expectations for this period, bringing us closer to the project conclusion. Regarding the building phase, we managed to add close to 4 million homes passed during the year with the state-of-the-art 5A technology. With this result, we now have reached 6.1 million additional homes passed since the third quarter of 2021. which implies that we are very close to conclusion, it is important to highlight that we have achieved this within the timeframe initially established by the company. With respect to penetration levels, we have reached a total average of 13% as of December. However, for some territories that we have been operating for a longer period, we have started to see levels of 20%. This allows us to be optimistic about regional penetration targets in all of the territories and thus to achieve the expected return of investment. At the same time, we have continued with our network evolution project, which is another initiative that supports our fiber adoption. During this year, we have migrated more than 6.1 thousand kilometers to fiber from the HFC network. to reach a start of 35,000 kilometers updated since we started this project in 2020. Both initiatives have contributed to increase the percentage of fiber footprint in the company's network as of the end of 2023. 63% of our subscribers are already getting their service through this technology. This ensures the competitive capacity of the company, not only for the present, but also for the coming years. Also, it is important to note that the CapEx figure for the year is in line with these efforts, as it reflects the top quality infrastructure that we are deploying. Considering the peak of the investment cycle was in 2023, CapEx levels will start to decrease in the short term. starting in this year, 2024, in which not only we expect a lower capex to revenue rate when compared to 2023, but also the actual amount spent will be lower. The investments we carried out during this period are reflected in the net additions coming from the new cities, but also in a higher growth rate than the rest of the market in the legacy territories. Regarding the results of the period, we were able to record the best figure in revenues for the mass segment since we announced the initiative, with a very positive outlook for the following quarters in the corporate segment. The revenues for the period remained below the figure recorded in the fourth quarter of 22, due to a difficult comparison effect. However, in the normal performance of the business, we had the best quarter of the year. The outstanding performance in revenues allowed us to see double digit growth in consolidated EBITDA with a margin that exceeded the market expectations. As we have established before, our expansion territories were going to positively contribute to EBITDA duration by the end of 2023, and we achieved that. Margin for the quarter was close to 20% in the expansion territories. Going forward, we are aiming at a higher margin for 2024 when compared to the previous year, as expansion cities continue to improve their performance due to a higher penetration. Our financial position remains strong. Despite the increase in our debt, we maintain one of the lowest leverage ratios in the industry. It is worth noting that our current net debt to EBITDA ratio is in line with the significant investments we have made. As you may know, we're in the process of issuing local sustainable notes of 8 billion pesos as part of our 20 million pesos debt program. Importantly, a portion of the proceeds raised from these issuance will be deployed toward our network evolution and expansion projects. The remaining proceeds will be used to repay the debt maturing in 2024. In this sense, our financial market management coupled with our strong market position enabled us to receive AAA credit ratings from Fitch and HAR ratings. On the other hand, Sustainable Fitch granted our sustainable debt framework the opinion of excellence, the highest grade with respect to the alignment of our framework with the most relevant international principles. In this context, I would like to highlight the increasing relevance of sustainability practices in our operations. Our strategies now aim to integrate ESG practices utilizing energy-efficient technologies to reduce our environmental footprint while reinforcing our commitment to promoting digital inclusion, ensuring that our growth translates into tangible benefits for all our stakeholders. As we move forward in 2024, our focus remains on growth, technologically evolution, and enhancing operational efficiency. We are committed to delivering industry-leading margins and providing exceptional value to our customers and shareholders. In conclusion, this quarter's performance is clear proof of our strength as our strategic initiatives are clearly showing results. Thank you for your support and trust. We look forward to another year of growth and expansion. Now, I hand the floor to Raimundo for his remarks on our operational performance.

Thanks, Enrique, and good morning, everyone. As we review our operational performance for both the fourth quarter and full year 2023, It is evident that our progress is closely aligned with our expansion and network evolution initiatives, which have gained considerable momentum and will continue their trend during 2024. The path ahead is clear to us, as we have established a plan and have been executing in that direction. This strategy has put us in a position where we have built most of the homes that we plan to become a national player. And even with these investments, we still maintain leverage with reasonable boundaries. We have recorded the best annual growth figure in terms of new subscribers, whose permanency with the companies reflected in this quarter's ARPU and mass market revenue figure. Additionally, as penetration in the new territories continues to improve, also consolidated margin has also started to recover. With such a strategy, we're ensuring that we will be able to continue generating value for our shareholders over the long term. So the future looks brighter. The company has a track record of efficient execution. And now that we have passed the most demanding part of the investment cycle, we will be focusing all our efforts on capturing all the value we can from the investment made. Moving into results, we have further extended our infrastructure. adding 3.1 thousand kilometers of fiber, thus expanding our reach to an additional 885,000 homes. This figure brings our total number of homes added this year to roughly 3.9 million, beating our initial target. In terms of technological deployment, during the quarter we converted an additional 2,000 kilometers of our network from coaxial to fiber, thus enhancing the connectivity of 400,000 homes with full fiber technology. For the full year, we have updated more than 61,000 kilometers or more than 1.1 million home paths of the existing territories. Once again, as Enrique mentioned, with the results of this year, we now have a total of 6.1 million additional home paths from the expansion initiative and more than 35,000 kilometers of updated network related to our network evolution project. On the subscriber front, we achieved a stronger sequential load due to the enhanced sales and marketing operations implemented during the period. Our total unique subscriber count has now reached 4.9 million, an annual growth of 13%, including 548,000 net additions, with 148,000 coming from the fourth quarter alone. Now, in the internet segment, we recorded a 14% year-over-year growth, now serving 4.7 million subscribers. Of these, 157,000 subscribers were added this quarter, bringing the full-year figure to 584,000 net additions, where our continuous network upgrades were instrumental. A significant highlight is that 63% of our internet subscribers now enjoy high-speed connections to our fiber service, a significant achievement from the 50% of last year. This underlines our commitment to provide a faster and highly reliable internet service. Our video subscriber base increased to 3.9 million, a 7% year-over-year growth, or 238,000 net additions, with 25,000 subscribers at this quarter. The XView platform continues to be a cornerstone to our offering, with its user base expanding by 22%. reaching 2.9 million subscribers by quarter end. The platform's innovative features, including personalized content and interactive options, continue to drive customer engagement with monthly interactions surpassing 108 million. In the telephony segment, we recorded 20% year-over-year growth, now serving 4.1 million subscribers. Net additions amounted to 678,000, with 176,000 from this quarter. REUs reached 12.7 million, a 13% growth from the previous year, reflecting the progress of our expansion plan. The MVNO segment showed a strong growth, with a 21% increase year-over-year of 77,000 net additions, standing at over 433,000 subscribers. On a sequential basis, this segment recorded 19,000 net additions. This shows our strategic focus on output contribution over quantity in customer acquisition. Shown rates for internet video and telephony are 1.8%, 2.2%, and 2%, improving when compared to the previous quarter. Proof of our success is in customer retention in expansion territories. where a big portion of the subscribers that have tried this service decide to continue with the company, as well as the seasonality effect. The ARPU Perionix subscriber stood at 426 pesos, 2% higher than that of the fourth quarter of 2022 and the third quarter of 2023, even considering the significant subscriber increase recorded during the period, reflecting the effectiveness of our pricing strategies and service quality, despite a higher competitive environment. By segment, ARP of broadband, video, and mobile services increased more compared to the same quarter of last year, while on a sequential basis, the ARP of internet and video services also recorded increases. On the corporate side, the corporate telecom segment recorded a lower figure than that of the fourth quarter of 2022, mainly due to the extraordinary results that all achieved last year. However, On a sequential basis, this segment reached a 10% increase and the best quarterly figure of the year, mainly supported by the recovery of OLA. On a full year comparison, this segment recorded a 5% increase as a result of the positive performance of MetroCard and MCM. Before concluding, I would like to mention that this year's investments have been higher than initially expected, but as we have commented, we are certain that this year represents a window of opportunity that we decide to take advantage of by accelerating our plans. Nevertheless, this year CAPEX includes nearly 4 million additional home paths, almost half of the goal of the entire expansion plan, the addition of nearly 600,000 broadband subscribers, more than 900,000 set-to-box and a similar amount of modems, ONTs for broadband, added 7,000 employees to reach more than 31,000. We are now providing service in nearly 55 expansion cities, and the conversion of more than 6,000 kilometers from HFC to fiber technology among our main initiatives. We are very proud of what this organization has achieved with that amount of investment. There is no doubt that no other company has such interest and focus on execution and efficiency than MEGA. In conclusion, our strategic approach to infrastructure technology, customer satisfaction, and strategic market penetration position us on solid ground for continued growth, remaining confident in our ability to maintain momentum and achieve our operational target for 2024. Thank you for your attention. I will now hand over the call to Luis, who will provide a detailed analysis of our financial performance.

Thank you, Raimundo. Good morning, everyone. First of all, like every year, it is important to clarify that all the competitive figures related to 2022 used in our report correspond to the 2022 Auditor Financial Statements, which were published on May 2nd of 2023, and could differ from the numbers reported in the quarterly report a year ago. Now, moving into results. In the fourth quarter 2023, the company's consolidated revenues reached 7.9 billion pesos, a 9% year-over-year growth that derives mainly from the positive performance of our SMART segment that recorded an accelerated subscriber growth during the period. For the full year 2023, Consolidated revenues stood at approximately 29.9 billion pesos, a 10% increase over 2022. In the mass segment, we recorded a revenue increase of 15% over the quarter, totaling 6.4 billion pesos. Our service offerings posted substantial revenue growth with internet, video, MVNO and telephony rising 20%, 11%, 16%, and 10% respectively, largely reflecting the execution of our expansion and network evolution plan. For the full year, mass segment revenues reached 24.5 billion pesos, up 11% compared to 2022. The revenues for the corporate segment decreased when compared to the fourth quarter of 2022, mainly due to a high comparison base. However, on a sequential basis, it increased 9% due to a significant recovery of OLA web. For the full year, this segment revenue recorded a 4% increase to reach 5.4 billion pesos. In terms of revenue distribution, The mass segment accounted for 82% of the company's total revenue in 2023, with the corporate segment contributing the remaining 18%. The cost of services and SDNA for the fourth quarter increased 7% and 8% year-over-year, amounting to 2.3 and 2.1 billion pesos below revenue growth for the period. For the full year, this cost rose by 17% and 13% year over year, reaching 8.6 and 7.9 billion pesos respectively. Consolidated EBITDA for the quarter was 3.5 billion pesos. recording a 12% increase from the same period, 2022, and with a margin expansion to reach 44%. For the full year, EBITDA grew 5%, reaching 13.3 billion pesos with a margin of 44.6%. On the other hand, the quarterly EBITDA for cable operations increased 12% when compared to the fourth quarter of 2022. with a 44% margin. In the full year comparison, the growth was 5% with a 46.2% margin. We rated our expectation of a gradual improvement in margins towards the free expansion level in line with the positive EBITDA contribution ramp up in the expansion . Our net income for the fourth quarter was 648 million pesos. recording a 13% increase compared to the same period last year. In the same line of EBITDA increase on a sequential basis, a 22% growth was recorded when compared to the third quarter 2022 as a result of a lower net financial expense. The full year net income was 2.8 billion pesos down when compared to 2022, reflecting the higher depreciation rate as a result of an investment carried out as well as the higher financial expenses. CAPEX was 3.9 billion pesos during the fourth quarter, 2023, to reach 12.9 million at year end, representing 43.3% of yearly revenues. The full year amount is a result of the extraordinary investments that were carried out during the period, which allowed the company to exceed the expansion goals that were initially established for 2023. Looking ahead, considering that the investment peak has already passed, we expect CAPEX to gradually decrease and land around 20% by 2027. This will be due to increased revenues, the reduced need for extensive investments, the maturation of infrastructure in new territories, and a strategic shift from expansion to consolidation. Turning to the balance sheet, As of December 31st, 2023, net debt was 20.2 billion pesos, up 53.5% compared to 13.2 billion pesos recorded at the end of the previous year. This growth is largely due to the engagement of additional debt oriented toward network evolution and expansion projects during 2023. The net debt to EBITDA ratio stood at 1.5 times compared to 1.4 times at the end of 2022, remaining within the company's expected range. As Enrique mentioned, this metric is projected to increase to 1.7 times with the completion of sustainable local notes in March before a gradual decrease in the following period. Meanwhile, the interest coverage ratio remains solid, staying at 6.1 times over the last 12 months, showing our swift capacity to manage financial obligations despite the aggressive expansion. As we step into 2024, we remain confident in our performance and strategic vision, seeking to further capitalize on our market expansion and upgraded network to drive revenue growth and profitability. Our commitment remains firm towards shareholders' values within the framework of financial discipline. With this, I conclude my remarks and will now turn the call back to the operator for the Q&A session. Thank you.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, at this time, we'll be conducting a question and answer session. If you'd like to ask your question, you may press star 1 on your telephone keypad. Confirmation tone will indicate your line is in the question queue. You may press star two if you would like to remove your question from the queue. For participants using speaker equipment, it may be necessary to pick up your handset before pressing the star key. Our first question comes from the line of Vitor Tamita with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed with your question.

Hello. Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for taking our questions. It's two questions from our side. The first one is if you could give us some more color on how much capex could decline and how much margins could improve in 2024 following the significant progress of the expansion plan in 2023. And the second question from our side would be more on the operational side of the expansion plan. Since you are now at a later stage of the expansion plan, Would you say that the latest areas or cities that you have been entering have a different profile from the areas or cities that you were prioritizing and entering initially? Are those newer cities any smaller or any more competitive? And are you entering them with any differences in promotional or commercial approach than how you were approaching those new cities at the beginning of the expansion? Thank you.

Yes, Victor, thank you very much for your question.

Very interesting. Luis, do you want to go with the CAPEX?

Sure. For 2024, we expect a range from 33% to 35% of revenues, and basically a margin gradually going back to 47%. Of course, not in this year, but we will see an expansion in the margin for 2024.

2024 will have an expansion. Gradually, as you say, we will reach those levels in 2027, but we will have an improving margin for 2024. And the capex, and we want to be clear there, is going to have a significant decrease on that part. As we stated in our program, we built 4 million home paths. When we say we are going to build at the beginning 2.5, we did that because we want to capture the market momentum And we could, and we can. That's why we are in a very strong position. That doesn't mean this is the level and this is the plan that we have for 2024. It's completely different. 2024, we will continue to increase our footprint, our expansion plan. Our initial plan was to get to 17.5 million home paths. We're at 15.5. So we are very, very close to the initial goal that we have. And we will build those 2 million home paths in the years to come. Some in 2024 and some in 2025. So we will slow down because we speed up on 2023. And that has to be very clear. CapEx is going to decrease. Over revenue and absolute numbers too. So that one is part. And margins, as we say, on this fourth quarter, and everybody noticed that, our margins improved on fourth quarter. And they will continue to improve in 2024. Not to the levels where we were at the beginning of, before the expansion plan, but we will continue to improve year over year until we reach the 47, 48% by 2027 pretty much. That's complementing what Luis says, you know. Regarding the expansion territories, we're very, very, very clear in our strategy. We have a good XView platform product and a good speed, process, and promotional. We try not to put too much, we try not to target those below the competition price for no more than a promotional temporary campaign. we are decreasing the campaign from the initial aggressive plan that we have to less of that, that will give us also a better revenue coming from those markets. And the good thing on that part is that after finishing the promotional period of the existing subscribers in those markets, we managed to lower any churn coming from those promotions. That's why we're growing so good in terms of the expansion plans, and we recovered during the fourth quarter. Those were the adjustments we made. Now, we're not going to build more cities. We're going to stay with those 60 cities, total 55 that we built in the last 18 months, but we will continue to grow a network within those cities. That's another great advantage for us because we already have all the operational bases Most of the employees, both those that are variable, if we increase the number of sales, we have more salesmen and more installers, but we have all the back office to operate. We have all the hubs. We have all the facilities. All the facilities to provide the service in all those cities. That's why capital will decrease and operational efficiency will increase, and also penetration of those facilities. markets is increasing. As Enrique says, we have 13%, and in some of the old areas, we reach almost 20% when we were aiming that in five years. So we're very happy on that, and I took a lot of the – I took your three points of the question to expand my message, but it's very important to have those parts clear, increasing of the margins and decreasing of the capits. Thank you, Victor.

Perfect. Very clear. Thank you.

Our next question comes from the line of Marcelo Santos with JP Morgan. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, good morning, Henrique, Raimundo, Luis. Thank you for the opportunity for asking questions. I wanted to double-click a bit on this change in promotional strategy. When you say you made some adjustments, does it mean that the promotional period ended in some cities, or you really changed a bit the strategy? You were realizing you can grow with fewer promotions than you thought. Just wanted to understand exactly what changed the dynamics, because I think this was important to see the increase in ARPU that you posted on the quarter, right? So I just wanted to understand this better. And regarding the margin, it was a pretty good margin in the quarter. Was there any non-recurring fact, maybe you provisioned too much for bad debt when there was churn in the previous quarters and now you released, or Or is this really an effect of being able to have good penetration that's having operating leverage? I just wanted to see any known usual item that might have helped margins in this quarter. Thank you.

Luis, you want to go with the margin? Because I talked too much. I can go to the other one.

You can talk on the other one for a while. So the margin, what we think the margin is going to... To go up, as we explained, this means that the margin we saw in the fourth quarter was without or clean margin, and we expect that to continue and to expand a few basis points quarter over quarter. So that's sustainable from our perspective.

Yeah. That is non-recurrent. Non-recurrent.

It's a special impact.

And on the other one, Marcelo, what we did was we got stronger with the execution of the Salesforce. We implemented technology to make sure that all the new sales are good sales. We increased the price of the initial hookup. First of all, they have to pay an advance payment of X amount, and then we put a higher amount. So we are sure that we get good subscribers coming here on that part. The promotional itself increased also in price by a certain amount, 50 pesos, instead of charging, let's say, 400, we charge 450. So we get better on that part because we feel we can do that. And the adjustment that we made was part of the sales force, when they get supervised, you know some of them they just leave the company and go back to the competition where they have probably more freedom to do that that's why we have that third quarter fourth quarter we make the adjustments and what was more of the execution nothing for you to to worry about about whether we're more aggressive or less aggressive in terms of of lowering prices or tariffs. No, it's not that. We're increasing what we're doing there and continue to our strategy of providing the subscribers a good XView platform and broadband service. So there is nothing really strange but to work with the people. As I said, we put 7,000 new employees in the company and we need to supervise and we need to put And those are the adjustments that we make at the beginning of the third quarter last year that capitalized on the fourth quarter, and we continue to expect that to happen for 2024. Thank you, Marcelo.

Thank you very much.

Our next question comes from the line of Carlos Lagaretta with E2. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, thank you, everybody. Good morning. I have two questions on my end, please. The first one is, after more than a year that you have been upgrading fiber to the home, can you talk us about the difference in economics in the standard fiber? Is it cheaper to maintain compared to HFC? And also, if you have lower churn in your fiber customers versus HFC? And the second question is regarding the enterprise segment. Obviously, during 2023, we saw a slowdown in terms of growth. For 2024, do you think it's feasible to resume the growth? Thank you.

Thank you, Carlos. Always a pleasure. Well, the trend of economics is not to increase. You know, we have a good year in terms of dollars in that part. That's something that we do not control. But what I can tell you is that the price of – if you look at the numbers that we have and the amount that we invest, we continue to currently lower the lower investment per kilometer in the industry. We see a trend in fiber on that part that is very efficient. the price of the fiber decreases slightly, but slightly, you know, it's not that much what it can decrease. It's a passive network, so it doesn't consume power from the electricity, so it's saving in the optics, too. I can tell you that in those markets, customer satisfaction, of course, in a brand new network and bringing is higher. We have less complaints and better customer satisfaction than we had before. We've been improving as a company by far by all the projects, the evolution and the other one, and the expansion project. So it is a better service, and we're very happy with that part. Lower maintenance. Lower maintenance, as I said, with electricity and everything is brand new. So you can bet that it's a good decision what we've done on that part. For the corporate segment, as I said, it was a good year. The problem was that we have an extraordinary four quarters in 2022, mostly coming from OLA. But it was in general a good year. You can expect that we continue to provide double digits, around 10%. I can tell you that that 10% for 2024 in the corporate segment is achievable, and that will be my answer.

Thank you so much, Ramon. Thank you, Carlos.

Our next question comes from the line of Luca Brengeren with Bank of America. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, good morning everyone. Thank you for taking my question. Two on my side here. First on ARPU, I think this was one of the positive surprises of the quarter, ARPU up 5% on internet. What were the drivers for that and should we continue to see growth in those levels for 2024? I remember in the past you mentioned that you were increasing prices for your old regions, but for the new regions, you had a promotional effort, so probably it's one of the drivers. And second, on churn, do you still see room to decline churn even further, or are you close to what you believe are the levels you'll be seeing for the mature regions as well? Thank you.

Thank you, Luca. The air pool that we have, it was significant. It was a good increase in air pool. It's coming from two parts. One is the not only the increase of rates of the organic system, but also the increase of subscribers that we have in those systems. We have more are used. So both on that part, rates that we always try to keep with inflation in the organic markets. on that part. So that is one part of the ARPU that we have there. The other one is on the expansion programs, as we said. As we continue to grow and to see that the subscribers end the promotional period, the ARPU will continue to increase. It cannot increase higher in general because we continue to add new subscribers. So looking forward, we can tell you that we will have a slight increase for 2024, conservative increase in 2024. Why? Because in the new market, we have a big growth coming from 2024 that will have promotional, with a lower output than what we have in general in the organic parts. So even though we raise or increase rates in the organic, we live with the promotional and the expansion, and that's an effect that will continue to be as long as we are a growth of fast. a high growth rate company. In terms of churn, you put the goal too high. Seasonality is good on the fourth quarter and we're doing a good job in terms of keeping the subscribers, but I wouldn't say that we expect that to decline. I wouldn't go as far as that. We feel happy with the levels of churn that we have in 2023 in general. taking away seasonality because when you are a fast-growing company, you know, it's not easy to keep a low churn in that part. So we will continue to have the levels of churn that you are familiar with on that part.

And thank you, Luca. Very clear. Thank you. Thank you.

Our next question comes from the line of Fatima Benitez with Compass Group. Please proceed with your question.

Hi. Hi, everyone. Congratulations on your results, and thank you for taking my question. I have just one question on my side. There have been many rumors about MEGA buying Televisa's Telecom part, the EC part, so I don't know if you have any comments on that.

No comments. No, no, no comments. We are pretty much focused in our expansion plan and the transformation of the network and our evolution. That's our focus, basically.

As simple as that? Fatima? Yeah? Mm-hmm.

Okay, perfect. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Fatima.

Our next question comes from the line of Alejandro Azar with GBM. Please proceed with your question.

Hi, Enrique, Raimundo, Luis. Good morning. Two quick ones. The first is on your dividend. You guys have been paying between 50% to 20% EBITDA in the past three, five years. I was just wondering if we should continue to see the dividend per share growing despite the expansion plan in this year and in the coming years. And the other one, I wanted to pick your brains on perhaps technological advances or changes. What are your thoughts on mobile internet in houses? Do you think that's a threat of the cable business? 5G, I mean. Thank you.

Thank you, Alejandro.

Enrique, you want to say something? Yes. The policy of the dividend is there. The policy is 15% of the EBITDA. We have been a little bit above that. That's not our take. That's the general shareholders' assembly take. But we don't see, I mean, a problem with that. I mean, the levels of... Depth of the company are very, very healthy. Our balance sheet is healthy. So we don't see a risk if the shareholders decide to keep with the dividend. But that's not something that is up to the management of Megacaibo or us. We have been given the dividend for the past, you know, I don't know, the last 10 years, 12 years, and we're still very healthy in our finance. But that's up to the shareholders.

And the second part, Alejandro, regarding the technology, no, we do not see any threat on the part. So far, all our market research shows that fiber or FIGS Networks is the key for a healthy broadband, unlimited service to the home or to the enterprise. There is no other way to get there. There is no return on investment that can justify the 5G for the companies. Even when they see that there is not going to be any improvement in ARPU, on their part or an improvement in the bandwidth consumption by competing to us. I just don't see that. You know, there is other trend regarding satellite. It's the same, I can tell you. If you look at the United States, you look at Europe and that, in general, fixed networks, fiber, is the way to be for the needs of the future of our population in that part. We are more looking into our network. It can be evolved. in a very, very efficient and cheap manner, not only to 10 gigabits right now, we're at 2.5 gig, that's the kind of technology that we have. We have some areas where we're beginning to test 10G, but the trend is to go to 25 or even to 50 gig to the home. There is no way still that wireless can compete to us in the years to come. So I don't see any trend for this company coming from that part so far. What's going to happen in 50 years, we'll see. But the next years, and I'm talking about many, many years, fiber will continue to be the way to get there.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much, Raimundo and Enrique. Thank you, Alejandro. I'd like to hand it back to management for any webcast questions.

Okay, we have some. The first one has come from Alessandro Conti from Jeffrey. What is the CAPEX plan for the next years? We saw that both Televisa, OPLAY, and AMX have lowered this number.

Okay, let me answer that, Alessandro, and thank you for the question. I remarked that at the beginning of the question. I will do it again because it's really an important part. The plan for next year is to be around 33 to 36 percent of our revenues on that part. It's going to decrease significantly from the 44 that we have this year in terms of percentage and absolute numbers. We are not going to stop the CAPEX. We will continue to do our expansion and G-point evolution plan, but in a much more lower level because we speed up on 2023. So that has to be clear. We put all this speed on the last year, and now we go to a much more conservative approach and cash back what we have and penetrate the market that we already have. That's the first part.

Okay, the second, what are the network expansion plans for 2024 and beyond?

Well, as I said, our original plan was to reach around 17.5 to 18 million home paths out of the 9.2 that we have when we started the project. We are at 15.5. So you can count that we will reach the 17.5 million home paths in the next years. It's not going to be 2024. It's going to be 2024, some 2025, and the least of them 2026 when we finish the five years. a on that part so if we build four million home paths this year you can bet that next year we won't build we're going to be building around 1.5 million home paths of the expansion territories you know and also someone some amount on the on the jeep on evolution around 1 million compass so that's pretty much what we want it has to be clear because all of you have the concern about whether we're going to lower the capex or not yes we're going to lower the capex We're going to lower the number of kilometers, but we will continue to grow to the expansion territories because we see an opportunity. It's a good timing, and we will do that.

OK. And the final one is, what are your expectations on how the penetration, particularly in of your existing homes path, is ramping up?

Well, I'm not so sure if he's talking about organic or he's talking about expansion. Talking about everything, as we said, we continue. to increase penetration in general. In the organic markets, we continue to increase penetration. We're beating the market growth that we have in our system. And that's a good question and important to say. In the organic territories, we continue to provide growth of subscribers in the broadband and above the market growth of the market. So that's proof that our G-point evolution and even the conversion of the HFC into less nodes with the products and the service that we have is a success. In the expansion territory, as we said, 13% pretty much is what we have so far. But that's a mix of new neighborhoods with lower penetration, and all neighborhoods with a higher penetration. So right now we are at 13%. Our goal in the expansion was to keep one-fourth of the market, which is 20% penetration. I'm pretty sure that in two or three years, whoever, all of us that we will be speaking in three years, we will see that our penetration could be very high.

Okay. The next one comes from Jared Friedberg from CKL. The company has incurred in incremental sales marketing and operating expenses because of the expansion project. As the project ends, would you begin to eliminate some of those expenses and when?

That's for sure, Jerry. I mean, that's when a company, every company that has an expansion plan as aggressive as ours, includes in big costs of subscriber acquisition and optics and everything related. Once we get to maturity, not maturity, but a much more higher penetration in 2027, you know, you will see that levels of sales and OPEX on that part will decrease. That's why Luis on the financial part tells you that we will go back to margins of 47, 48 once we reach 2027 when we have a higher ARPU, a higher revenue, higher ARPU, okay, and less of this need for sales so much because we won't have that growth.

And also, the cost will be more effective as we have broader subscribers.

Well said, Luis. Thank you.

Okay. The next one comes from Sergio Sanchez from CD Banamex. Which campus levels will be expected for 2024, 2025? We'll already answer that. Okay. And the next one is a follow-up from Jared. Even that mega is on the verge of generating a lot of cash flow. What are your current thoughts about capital allocation besides dividends?

Well, that's too early to say. I think you want to comment on that.

We're on the track. We're on the track of that. I think that it's going to be a debt reduction. I think we will get a better balance sheet over time. And then we'll see. We don't know yet. But definitely we will reduce debt over time.

Okay, and the following comes from Christopher Neeland from Harting Loeffner. Thoughts on the use of cash as you start to take down the capex in the coming years? I think it's very much the same question.

Enrique already answered it.

Okay, so we have no further questions in the queue. I'll pass it all over to Mr. Yamouni for final remarks.

Okay. As always, it was a pleasure to discuss our results with you. Please contact our investor relations department if you have any questions or concerns regarding the company. And have a wonderful day and a very good weekend. Thank you very much for your interest. Thank you, everyone.

Ladies and gentlemen, this does conclude today's teleconference. Thank you for your participation. You may disconnect your lines at this time and have a wonderful day.