EL7.AI
StocksMedium•23 October 2026•
4 min read

Crown Castle Shares Jump Nearly 10% After SpaceX Talks on Access to Cell Sites

Key Facts

1Crown Castle shares rose about 10% in extended trading on October 22, 2026, following the report on the talks.
2SpaceX is seeking access to at least 80,000 U.S. cell sites in talks that include Crown Castle.
3TD Cowen estimated that building a nationwide terrestrial network would cost more than 80 billion dollars and take years.
4Site rental revenue totaled 966 million dollars in the third quarter of 2026, compared with 1,012 million dollars in the same period of 2025.
5Adjusted funds from operations rose to 530 million dollars from 490 million dollars a year earlier, an increase of 8%.

Crown Castle shares jumped about 10% in extended trading on Thursday, October 22, 2026, following a report on talks by SpaceX to secure access to cell sites, according to Investing.com. Reuters, citing Bloomberg, reported that SpaceX is seeking access to at least 80,000 sites in the United States to build a wireless network, and that the talks include the U.S. tower company. That figure refers to sites the company is seeking access to in the ongoing talks, rather than sites already under contract. Asked about potential contracts with SpaceX and Amazon, Crown Castle Chief Executive Christian Hillabrant said the company was talking to "all parties." Hillabrant declined to discuss specific customers, according to Reuters. Elsewhere in the telecom sector, shares of AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile fell in extended trading the same day. The companies' shares lost between 4.2% and 5%, according to the news agency.

Crown Castle's portfolio includes about 40,000 cell towers in the United States, according to the company's third-quarter 2026 earnings release. Its business includes owning, operating and leasing those towers, activities that place it among the parties with which SpaceX is discussing site access. TD Cowen estimated that building a nationwide terrestrial network would cost more than 80 billion dollars, Reuters reported on October 22. The firm said building such a network would take years. The site talks follow an October 8 Reuters report on a deal for SpaceX to buy a nationwide spectrum portfolio from Grain Management. The deal includes the purchase of 100% of the company's portfolio in the 800 megahertz band, as part of spectrum enabling Starlink mobile services. The deal remains subject to approval by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, according to the news agency.

Interest in the site talks coincided with a year-on-year decline in Crown Castle's site rental revenue. That revenue totaled 966 million dollars in the third quarter of 2026, according to the company's earnings release. That compares with revenue of 1,012 million dollars in the third quarter of 2025, placing the SpaceX talks against a backdrop of declining revenue from the existing rental business. The company reported adjusted organic growth in site rental billings of 3.8% in the third quarter of 2026. Comparable growth was 4.1% in the third quarter of the previous year, according to the results table. The adjusted organic growth measure excludes the effects of Sprint cancellations and DISH terminations. Growth in billings under this measure therefore slowed, alongside a decline in total site rental revenue from its year-earlier level.

Crown Castle's adjusted funds from operations, meanwhile, rose in the third quarter of 2026, according to the company's release. They totaled 530 million dollars, compared with 490 million dollars in the same period a year earlier. The measure grew 8% year on year despite the decline in site rental revenue during the period. Crown Castle attributed the improvement primarily to lower interest expense and fewer common shares outstanding. The company linked both reductions to its use of proceeds from the sale of its fiber and small cell businesses. It said revenue changes partly offset the positive impact of those factors on adjusted funds from operations. The increase in the financial measure was therefore driven primarily by those changes in expenses and shares following the sale, according to the company's explanation of its results.

For the full year 2026, Crown Castle raised the midpoint of its site rental revenue outlook, according to its earnings release. The current midpoint is 3,875 million dollars, compared with 3,855 million dollars in its previous outlook for the same year. The revision reflects an increase in the company's annual revenue estimate from its previous forecast. However, the midpoint of the current outlook remains below the company's actual revenue in 2025. Site rental revenue that year totaled 4,049 million dollars, according to the comparative figures in the release. The company's 2026 estimate thus combines an improvement from its previous forecast with an expected revenue total that remains below last year's.