Uniti Group Inc. (UNIT) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

All right. Good morning. Welcome to day 2 of the Cowen Communication Infrastructure Summit. My name is Greg Williams. I cover the cable, telco and comm infra space here at Cowen. I'm delighted to be joined by Kenny Gunderman, the CEO of Uniti. Today's format will be a 40-minute fireside chat. I do have a screen off to my right that shows the queue of questions. If you have any questions, I can read them in, simply input the questions in the system. I think it's a box down below.

Without further ado, let's get started. Kenny, thanks for joining us. I wanted to get right at the -- your expectations for Windstream. In June, you guys -- or Windstream received the restructuring plan from the court approvals. I think you're -- they're emerging in late August, they noted on their earnings call or that's the expectation. They received -- you guys received the true lease option. So what are the next milestones that remain in your near-term priorities as Windstream does prepare from bankruptcy? And maybe we can go further ahead of that. Help us understand what 2021 will look like?

First, Greg, it's great to be here. Thanks for having us again. Sorry, we're not all together in Boulder, but this is working out great. Yes. And I think everything you just said about Windstream is right, with maybe one exception, I think, rather than Windstream emerging in August, it looks like early September is sort of what they're signaling. Again, we don't know with 100% certainty, even it feels like it's maybe September. But everything else that you said is right. We feel like we're on track. The settlement, we're very excited about that. I'm sure we'll talk a little bit about that today. But very excited about that. Windstream just priced their exit financing last night so that's come together. And we did get true lease opinions, which were very important, obviously, for us because it revalidates the fair market value of the rent, which hasn't changed and it revalidates a lot of the other fair market value components of the master lease that we have. So I think we're on track. And to your question about priorities, we've been spending a lot of time in the past couple of years or really past 18 months during this very volatile period preparing for this moment. So preparing for an opportunity for -- to become a more investable company, to use a term that others have used, where we know investors are now starting to refocus on the story with a lot of the rhetoric and the volatility subsiding. And so we focused on divesting some noncore businesses at great prices, exiting some noncore businesses, nonrecurring, very low margin businesses, non-readable revenue. So that whenever the time came for investors to start focusing on the story, again, we're a lot cleaner story, which I'm sure we'll talk about some of that today. But a lot cleaner story and a healthier tenant and a revalidated and a hardened master lease. And so all of those priorities, I think, have resulted in an opportunity for us to really present ourselves in a better way to the market, and we're really excited about that.

Great. You guys just had your print on Monday. And I was wondering if you could articulate any of the impacts you've seen from COVID-19 and the pandemic, it seems like you're seeing very little. We just had Digital Colony speak about 20 minutes ago, and they also noted that it was Zayo's time to shine in fiber, and they certainly did. So it doesn't sound like you had any -- the permitting delays or the installation delays that you did caution because I think you cautioned 50,000 to 75,000 in possible delays and only saw about 13,000, I think. Maybe you can just speak to resiliency of the network and your performance during the pandemic?

Yes. We've really seen virtually no effect. And we've been signaling some caution just in case because let's face it, we're all in a fairly unprecedented period here where you just don't know what's going to happen. But the reality is our business has proven highly resilient. We've had no customer churn or disconnects related to COVID. We've had now down to 12,000, 13,000 of install delays because customers had said, "Hey, we don't want you coming out to turn up our service." That's not churn, that's just a delay on installs. And that number started at 50,000, it's now down to 13,000, and I expect it's going to continue to dissipate over the coming months. We haven't seen a negative effect on bookings. That's really the 50,000 to 75,000 that I was referring to, Greg, as opposed to installs, but that hasn't played out. We've seen -- we've had strong bookings through the first quarter. And bookings and installs have held strong through July. So the 3 leading indicators that I focus on are bookings, installs and churn and all of those continue to be very strong. And so when I think about the effects of COVID, I think they're very positive for our business because it revalidates what we've said all along, and I know Mark said this morning, and Dan is probably going to say it in an hour that the fiber business is just -- it is mission-critical. It is highly resilient, and it is all those things that we've been saying for a couple of years now. And I think COVID has been a good opportunity for us to prove that.

So on the print, again, on Monday night, you cautioned another 50,000 to 75,000 delay. It sounds like that's erring on the side of conservatism? Or is there something specific tied to that as part of the fiber?

No. Just I'd say that was probably a holdover from the script 3 months ago. So it's just conservatism. I'm not suggesting that we shouldn't keep that conservatism, but there's nothing that I'm seeing to suggest that the trends are going to change. Again, in fact, July was really the strongest month of installs we've ever had in our history. And we had a good month of enterprise and wholesale bookings. And enterprise is really the area that is of most concern because that's where you could have some churn and you could have -- it's not practical for our salespeople to be out making physical sales calls, for example. And so when you look at things like that, you think, well, that might turn into lower bookings, thus the conservatism, but the reality is we just haven't seen that yet. So we'll continue to monitor very closely.

Very nice. Another highlight on the print I thought was the leasing or the lease-up disclosures that you provided. You noted that you've sold 3x the bookings off of the anchor builds and about $7 million in annualized lease-up revenue 2020 year-to-date. We've heard pressure from other fiber providers on the ability to lease-up. So how are you able to deliver this lease-up strength?

Yes. I'm really glad you're focusing on that, Greg. And we obviously put it out there because we're proud of it, but also because we've spent a lot of money the past couple of years building these anchor projects in 15 or 16 large dark fiber builds and small cell builds, and we've been telling our investors that we're excited about these. And so we wanted to show the proof of our execution on our strategy. And I think it starts with the strategy. When you look at our business, we have a very wholesale-centric national infrastructure business. And so when you look at the country and you look at what we're doing at Uniti Leasing, that's really all lease-up. We're not building new fiber in most of the country, we're really just leasing up the existing fiber, which has now been supercharged with our settlement with Windstream in terms of the amount of fiber that we have. So when you look at the leasing deals that we're doing, those are all very high margin, low CapEx, very cash flow accretive opportunities that we've demonstrated success on for the past 2 years and will continue demonstrating success on going forward. The anchor builds that you're referring to that we called out in our earnings on Monday are in the Southeast region, where we're really actively managing a fiber business as opposed to just being a wholesale provider. So in the Southeast, where we are actively managing, we are building some greenfield projects, where Verizon needs backhaul or AT&T needs small cells or T-Mobile needs small cells, building those anchor awards generally in the 5% to 10% initial yield territory that we've always talked about. But the key to getting to good returns, 10-plus percent cash flow yields, requires lease-up, requires that second wireless customer or in our case, a second wireless customer or enterprise or wholesale or all of the above. And we wanted to demonstrate to our investors that we are actually executing on that lease-up because in order to get to those 10% plus yields, in our case, we called out 40% yields on the incremental lease-up this year, you have to execute on the lease-up to get those economics and to drive good margins on those networks, and that's exactly what we're doing.

Got it. And these lease-ups, they're mostly nonwireless customers. Can you help me understand the mechanics of a lease-up? Maybe I'm envisioning that you have dark fiber run for small cells in 5G as your anchor build and then, what, enterprises or education will ride on top of that conduit, if you will. And you said actively managed. So are these lit services because you also talked to low CapEx? It seems like it's mostly dark services. Help me just contextualize what these lease-ups look like?

It's a little bit of -- so the lease-up is a combination of wireless and nonwireless. So most -- all of the anchors are wireless, but then the lease-up is a combination of a second wireless tenant or a third wireless tenant and enterprise and wholesale, so it's a combination of all those things. And it's a combination of both additional dark fiber and lit services. And so when I say active, I do mean lit services. And so in our Southeastern region, in particular, we're providing lit services all the way down to dark fiber, and in some cases, conduit. And again, I think that's the way to drive optimal economics on these networks is to be open to adding new tenants, not just new wireless tenants but by adding enterprise and wholesale. And the economics of those deals range, but -- and I think this is the crux of your question, Greg. The capital intensity on lease-up is substantially lower than the initial build. And so there is some CapEx because you're building from a dark fiber run in -- as a lateral into a building or maybe you're adding splice points along the way to get to those buildings. So there is some capital required, but it's substantially less than the initial build and it's certainly at much higher margins.

And is the nonwireless lease-up yields higher than a wireless lease-up? Does it matter, I mean, I guess, the CapEx intensity. And you mentioned the anchor yield is up 7%. And now the second, third tenants, they then get a 40% incremental yield. I'm trying to understand how I can -- what the overall yields will start to look like? Ultimately, I'm trying to get to your CapEx intensity and in turn, margin when I think about all the data points that you are sort of throwing our way?

Yes. So the overall -- yes, the lease-up is fairly normalized across customer bases, I'd say. So don't -- I wouldn't distinguish between or among wireless and enterprise and wholesale as lease-up, they're all relatively in the same range in terms of capital intensity and margin. It's really -- the important distinction is between anchor, that anchor build that is generally in that 5% to 10% range. And I think we guided on Monday to 7% anchor yields on those 16 big projects that we disclosed. So that's kind of the category for the anchor. And that's where most of the capital was sent and that's our strategy. Use that to get into these markets, get a presence, build the network, get good, steady 7% yields for a generally a 10- to 20-year period with slight escalators and then come on top of that with lease-up, and that's where you get into those 40% incremental yields, which, on an aggregate basis, lead to 10%-plus yields. And of course, as you go on and add those second and third tenants, those aggregate yields obviously start to increase. And when you turn that into capital intensity, what does that mean for capital intensity? We've been guiding this for some time and now the data is starting to prove out that our capital intensity has really started to come down as we've started finishing these big dark fiber anchor builds and starting to lease-up. So you're making that pivot away from dark fiber builds to more lease-up, and we're guiding towards 30% to 35% capital intensity at Uniti Fiber. And I think that capital intensity is going to be a mix of additional greenfield builds over time, but mostly lease-up. And so we could talk about how much of that is lease-up versus new builds, but it will be a mix but it will be mostly lease-up on a go-forward basis.

Okay. So a lot of the CapEx will be on the lease-up?

Right.

Okay. I wanted to just switch over to Uniti Leasing. Sort of another highlight on the call was mentioned that you're doubling the amount of -- doubling the amount in your leasing pipeline to about $1 billion and 43% of which was newly acquired Wind assets. So you're obviously shopping these assets already, even though the deal hasn't been official. And help us understand what this new fiber does to augment the booking by so much. I mean are they unique assets? Or is it just the sheer volume of new fiber that you've got -- you've received that augmented the pipeline by so much?

Yes, a little bit of both. So we wanted to show a little more clarity on that funnel because we know that's important to our investors. We've gotten those questions about, "Hey, what are you going to do with all this fiber you're getting in the settlement?" And it's a good story because you're right, I mean, the funnel has doubled within just a few months. And actually, we're not actively managing it -- or I'm sorry, actively marketing it. We are marketing it to a few select carriers and customers, and you can probably guess who some of those might be. But because a lot of what has happened over the past 6, 9 months has been so public, we're actually getting a lot of inbound interest because it -- the telecom industry is pretty small, people know what we're getting and where this is going. So the active marketing of that network is probably going to start this quarter. We've been making some changes internally to prepare ourselves for that. And we now have the team in place and the infrastructure in place, and we're probably going to turn our salespeople lose to make active quoting -- to start active quoting this quarter or maybe next quarter, depending on when the deal actually closes because you don't want to sell it too far in advance and then have to wait for an unpredictable closing of the settlement. So I think when that active marketing starts, you'll see an even improved funnel from where it is today. And we're very excited about it. I mean I've been talking about that for some months now. And as we get deeper and deeper into the execution here, I feel better and better about it every day because I do think there's a tremendous amount of opportunity for us. And I think to your question, why is that the case? You can look at our map and see. I mean this network intersects very nicely with existing infrastructure that we have. We bought a national network from CenturyLink a couple of years ago. We bought infrastructure from TPx and from CableSouth and other acquisitions that we've made over the years, this network fits really nicely with a lot of that network. And so when we're presenting it to the market or when our carrier customers are looking at this opportunity with us, there are a lot of network solutions that we're able to provide that we couldn't before because we can now intertwine this network with what we had. And I think that intertwining of the network is a great opportunity for us, in addition to the fact that a lot of this network has not been marketed from a 5G perspective. It wasn't being marketed for small cells. It wasn't being marketed for dark fiber in a material way or it wasn't being marketed for backhaul and it certainly wasn't being marketed from an opco perspective. And that's something that is very unique to Uniti. And so when we're out talking to our customers and we're providing this network for the first time using those different products, for lack of a better word, I think we're having some unique and proprietary discussions that haven't been had before.

Interesting. So it's encouraging that hasn't even been marketed yet, yet such sizable pipeline growth. Are these assets -- are a lot of these assets Tier 1 assets in terms of the bookings or the booked pipeline, rather? And the line of questioning or the question is, what are you doing with the Tier 1 assets? Are you looking to sell them since they're noncore because you focus on Tier 2, Tier 3 cities? But if this pipeline is coming from Tier 1 assets, then maybe perhaps you'd keep them. I'm just trying to understand that thought process.

Yes. It's a good question. There's definitely a lot of Tier 1 fiber here, and where we're actively managing fiber, it's in the Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets. So you're drawing an important distinction. And as a result, where -- where those markets affect our funnel is generally more dark fiber, is generally more very, very wholesale-centric. So you're not going to see us go launch enterprise services in L.A. or in Portland or in Seattle, for example, those are much more passively marketed assets, including potentially opcos, certainly dark fiber and products of that ilk.

Got it. Would you consider selling the Tier 1 assets?

I think we've proven over the past couple of years, in particular, that we'll take a very shareholder-friendly approach to our assets. I mean we -- our strategy is to acquire and build and accumulate mission-critical infrastructure. But look, every day that we break ground and put fiber in the ground, or every day we put new towers up, that infrastructure is worth more the next day in the private market than it was the day before when we built it. And that's just the -- one of the beauties of our industry right now. So we've taken a very shareholder-friendly approach to our portfolio, so if we are presented with an opportunity that looks attractive from a valuation perspective, we would certainly consider it.

Got it. And your bookings overall were strong in the second quarter as well for all the reasons we sort of noted, 700,000 in MRR bookings, and it was 600,000 in the first quarter. So is this the new little of cadence to expect? Or is there some sort of onetime pandemic-related strength here?

Yes. There was no -- I agree. I think we had a good first half of the year from a bookings perspective, very good. And we also had a good mix of bookings. I always look at the mix and try to keep a good balance of greenfield in addition to lease-up. You never want to be too weighted towards either of those. You want to have a good mix, and we had a really good mix in the first half of the year. And I think that's going to continue in the second half of the year. We don't give guidance on bookings or installs, and so I don't want to start doing that. But I do think we're going to -- so far, we continue to execute well on both.

And on the installs, 900,000, I believe that was a record. Was this also sort of onetime COVID-related, same question? I mean is there something about the installs that were stronger this quarter than any particular quarter going forward? Is it just the pipeline is so big now and you're starting to ramp up?

Yes. I think, Greg, it's more of the pipeline has grown. And also, we really have put a focus on installs internally. As you know, last year and the year before, we had some install delays related to the big dark fiber projects that we were building. And as a result of that, we really focused on getting down to the core markets where we had the best municipal relationships and really focusing on taking our new markets from a strategy perspective where we had a better understanding of the permitting environment and we had better control over the permitting environment, which ultimately leads to more timely installs. So we really put a lot of focus on that internally. And we're now starting to see the fruits of that labor. So I think that's more the impact that you're seeing as opposed to any onetime or COVID-related effects in the first half of the year. Am I forecasting that that same cadence continues in the second half of the year? No, because we don't give guidance. But I would say again, July was the single biggest month of installs we've ever had in our history. And so the momentum is continuing through the third quarter so far. And by the way, the July -- the strength of July was driven in large part by E-Rate because E-Rate installs tend to happen in June and July, and we had a big E-Rate install in the month of July.

Understood. I wanted to switch gears and talk about the potential Windstream CLEC sale. I know it's probably a question to ask Windstream and not you, but it could be an important catalyst for your stock, and you're obviously in the know. So what's the confidence it will happen, maybe general time frame. Are they -- do you think they're working on it now? Or is this more of a long-term opportunity? And who would be the buyers of these assets? Who do you envision to be finding these assets interesting? It seems like CLECs are struggling, for lack of a better word, and they're typically asset-light. Help me understand an outcome of the CLEC sale by Windstream?

Yes. So Greg, I'd love to talk about that, but I shouldn't and so I won't comment too deeply on it other than to say that it's completely Windstream's option as to whether they pursue a sale or not. Their new owners -- the new owners haven't taken over yet. And whichever path Windstream and their new owners choose to pursue, Uniti will support it, whether they decide to keep the asset or monetize it. And I think there's opportunities for value creation for Windstream in either path that they choose.

Right. Maybe you can answer this. I mean typically CLECs are thought of as asset-light as they depend on type 2 cost for carriers, but there's obviously assets here because they're paying a portion of your rent to you. Is that fair to say? I mean there's real assets in the CLEC?

Yes. I think there's -- so some of the underlying network of that CLEC are owned by Uniti that Windstream is paying us rent on, and some of it is still owned outright by Windstream. So it's a little bit of both. But clearly, there are underlying assets to the CLEC. It's -- if you include what we own and what Windstream owns, it's not an asset-light CLEC.

All right. I wanted to talk about the Bluebird partial sale. On Monday, you mentioned that you're selling the majority stake in the Bluebird PropCo to Macquarie Infrastructure Partners. What was the rationale? It seems like it's a core asset, you are selling towers, you are selling your construction business, and we would have thought you were more acquisitive in terms of the fiber market, and it seem to be going the other way here.

Yes. I think you're -- I think you're right. The distinction between the fiber in the Bluebird deal versus some of the other monetizations that we've pursued in terms of core versus noncore or strategic versus nonstrategic is right. Clearly, fiber is very strategic to what we're doing. But with that said, we're not exiting the propco. We're not selling it outright. That fundamental deal with Bluebird is still in place, and we're still an important investor and partner to that business. So that -- we're not unwinding that. I would view it more as a financial partner coming into the propco for Uniti and almost view it as a financing as opposed to us selling the asset. And I say that because one of the strategic reasons that we were interested in pursuing that deal is because I think it's a nice blueprint for how we might pursue other propcos with other infrastructure funds or other nontraditional financing sources going forward. And I'm not suggesting that that will be a norm for us, but I am suggesting that that blueprint is helpful because we have gotten a lot of interest from nontraditional sources of capital, including infrastructure funds, about our portfolio of real estate, including the propco product, if you will, because if you think about it, that's a very infrastructure-friendly investment. You're buying an asset and you're putting an anchor tenant on that asset. It's a very mission-critical network to that opco's business. You're locking in a 10- or 20-year contract with a 8% or 9% yield with a slight escalator. That's a great infrastructure-type investment. And as you might guess, there's a fair amount of interest in those types of investments in the private market these days.

And you'll still retain some ownership. Can you give us a general sense of the level? I mean are we talking like the 49.9% ownership we saw with Lightpath last week? Or is it something substantially less?

Yes. So what we've chosen to say publicly, Greg, is that we sold the majority interest, but we're retaining a material interest ourselves. And I'll leave it at that today.

Okay. So material is the keyword. How should I think about the M&A environment for you guys? As I also think about the large CapEx that you'll spending in GCI payments to Windstream. Are there deals likely? Or I would imagine they'd be more limited or smaller in size. And how could you fund deals going forward?

Yes. So we -- over the past 1 year, 1.5 years, 2 years, we've definitely focused more on smaller deals, and we focused more on opco/propco transactions where, in some cases, the transaction has been cash accretive to us as opposed to a cash -- causing a cash financing requirement. And we love those deals, and we're going to continue to pursue those types of deals because that's a way of divesting ourselves of actively managed operations and turning that revenue into readable, long term, recurring, predictable cash flow. So we like those types of transactions, and you're going to continue to see those as part of our proprietary funnel. In terms of acquiring companies, going back to acquiring full companies inclusive of operations, I think we're preparing to get back into that mode. But in order for us to do that, we need for our cost of capital to normalize. We need for the market to start to appreciate, again, the fundamentals of our business to start to focus more on Uniti as opposed to the noise and the chaos and the rhetoric of the bankruptcy. And so back to maybe your first question and us emerging -- starting to emerge from all of that noise, that's part of what we're preparing ourselves for. The fundamentals are strong. The business is cleaner, healthier tenant, and we've continued to maintain the M&A funnel and the M&A discussions over the past 1 year, 1.5 years to prepare ourselves for a cleaner story, a better cost of capital and a hardened balance sheet and liquidity, and I think all of that's coming together.

And can you describe the road map for your cost of capital to go down? There's some credit upgrades that could be happening in short order. Could you take some of your cash from the TRS and put it to the QRS where it's more tax protected? Help us understand over the next few months how the cost of capital could work in your favor?

I think there's a lot of options that are presenting themselves to us now that weren't available before. And one of the keys is that we -- we don't want to be beholden to the capital markets. We don't want to have to raise capital. I think it's important for us to have the ability to fund our business internally. And as we've foreshadowed, and as we've said recently, including on Monday, we're funded through next year, if we choose to be. That doesn't mean we won't raise capital if the markets present themselves in a positive way or if opportunities present themselves in a positive way, whether it's traditional capital, raising debt, for example, or nontraditional, like monetizing part of a propco with an infrastructure partner in a capital-efficient way. So we have lots of options. Many of them are attractive. We're looking at ways to reduce our cost of debt. And I think when all of these things start to come together that we're working on, including making the story simpler, including focusing investors on the core fundamentals like 97% recurring revenue and 0.3% churn. Bookings and installs continue to be strong. We continue to put up good performance quarter after quarter. Our biggest customer is healthier, has no near-term time bombs on liquidity or a balance sheet or an activist investor. All of those things come together, I think that's going to lead to increased options on financing and ultimately, a better cost of capital. So in other words, we're just going to grind it out. We're going to keep focusing on the core fundamentals, and we're not waiting on any lightning strikes. We're just going to keep doing what we can control, and I think the rest will take care of itself.

Got it. So you don't need any funding through 2021, but if the opportunity presents itself, you would or could raise capital. Do you have a preference? You just mentioned your desire to reduce debt. But at the same time, you'd like your stock to go up to levels where you're trading at the multiples where you'd be buying. So would you prefer equity, would you prefer debt, prefer -- help me understand the mechanics that you'd prefer if you're raising?

Yes. Yes. I think if our CFO were on, he may have a different answer, but I'm on, I'll answer that. So look, first, I prefer to have options. I want to have options that we can present to our Board that are equally actionable and equally attractive so that we're not beholden to any particular subset of the capital markets and not beholden to the capital markets. And that's the situation that we're in today. We've got options, and that optionality, I think, translates into better execution and ultimately, better pricing. With that said, I prefer debt over equity because, especially these days, our equity is at a price that I'm not interested in selling and I don't think our Board is either. And so that's my preference. And as we said in our last -- on our last earnings call, our leverage right now is down to about 6.1x, which, Greg, as you know, historically, we've guided towards a range of targeted leverage of 5.5x to 6x. And so we're almost at -- we're almost back into that range, up -- sorry, down from, I think, we got to 6.4x at one point during the bankruptcy. So again, through just the core fundamental cash flow generation of our organic business and our opco/propco strategy, and through some of these nonstrategic monetizations, we've managed to bring down leverage to a point where our liquidity is hardened. Our balance sheet is almost back to the range where we want it to be. And so I feel really good about our optionality going into 2021.

Great. I just want to switch gears and talk about your dividend policy. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but you seem more tempered on the call on Monday about boosting the dividend. In the past, you said we're a REIT. We want -- a large portion of our AFFO should go to the dividend. And I heard things, like, it's a discussion with the Board we have constantly, et cetera. Help me understand the next milestones, your desire for boosting that dividend? I assume Windstream has to emerge from bankruptcy, the credit upgrade. Maybe get your debt to below 5.75x. Do all these things have to happen? And what is your desire to increase the dividend, and to what levels generally?

Yes. Well, the dividend is a Board-level discussion. It is a Board-level decision. And so we always make sure to say that because it's true, number one. And number two, the way I think about it, I'd like to, again, present options to the Board, good options, similar to what we might pursue from a capital-raising perspective. And I think the Board has great options today on how we use our capital. It's -- we've got really great options to invest our capital organically, whether it's building new fiber, anchor builds for small cells or backhaul, and then leasing up those networks in very margin friendly, cash-intensive ways. So we've got great ways to invest our fiber -- I'm sorry, invest our capital organically. I think, as you know, we've managed to build a proprietary M&A funnel, and we've executed on that over the years. And so I think the Board is confident that we've got inorganic ways to deploy our capital through M&A. So those 2 ways to invest our capital are great ways to create shareholder value. And we have demonstrated that we can buy or build assets and then monetize them at margin -- in margin accretive ways that lead to value for our shareholders. And so we've got a proven track record there. So those 2 are great options for our Board. And thirdly, the dividend -- raising the dividend, that's another good option. We're a REIT. We're always going to pay a dividend, and we want to get to a place where we're progressively raising that dividend over time. And so I think I'm not -- I don't want to make any claims about what we're going to do with the dividend or give any time lines on the dividend because it is a Board-level discussion, but we do always look at it in the context of what our other choices of investing are. And some of it is related to the cost of capital. Where is the stock trading? Are we getting credit for the dividend from investors, and are investors focusing on the fundamentals? Or are they still afraid of the rhetoric and the confusion from bankruptcy? And I think we've got to untether ourselves from that fear and that chaos and that rhetoric and get back to -- get away from perception and get back to reality and getting people focused on the fundamentals.

Great. Kenny, with that, I think we're out of time. I really appreciate your time. And hopefully, we can do this again live in Boulder next year.

I look forward to it, Greg, and look forward to the rest of the conference.

Okay. Thank you.