Fiber Growth Collides With Legacy Revenue Pressure At Telephone & Data Systems (TDS)

Fiber Growth Collides With Legacy Revenue Pressure At Telephone & Data Systems (TDS) Maham Fatima Tue, August 18, 2026 at 7:21 AM EDT 4 min read TDS AD TDS-PU TDS-PV On August 7, Telephone and Data Systems (NYSE: TDS ) held its second-quarter earnings call alongside its tower subsidiary, Array Digital Infrastructure, and the two businesses told very different stories. Fiber is expanding faster than at any point in company history, even as legacy copper and cable lines keep bleeding revenue. Layered on top is an unresolved offer from TDS to buy out the minority shares of Array that it does not already own, a deal both sides declined to discuss on the call. eToro's (ETOR) Acquisition Spree Signals A Bigger Ambition Than Trading Bull Case: Fiber Delivers Its Best Half Ever TDS Telecom added roughly 66,000 marketable fiber service addresses in the quarter, pushing first half 2026 delivery to about 106,000, the strongest opening half in company history and more than the back half of 2025, which is normally the peak building season. That pace pushed management to raise its full-year fiber address guidance to a range of 250,000 to 300,000, an increase of 50,000 addresses. Residential fiber net adds reached 15,100 for the quarter, up 47% year-over-year, and fiber revenue climbed 13%, or $11 million, helping offset losses elsewhere. The company is leaning on federal E-ACAM support to extend fiber to more than 300,000 addresses across 22 states and in April agreed to acquire Granit…