In the recent article on Frontier Communications (FTR) titled "Frontier Communications: 2018 and Beyond", a forecast for 4Q'17 results was provided. With the time of the earnings report for 4Q'17 having come and gone, we can compare the actual outcome of the 4Q'17 earnings report with the forecast, to see how well (or poorly) the methodology is working.
A central question about FTR is the ability to repay debt in the upcoming years and whether the "mountain of debt" can be paid down sufficiently to create confidence in the ability of FTR to become a sustainable enterprise. Indeed, the element in the earnings report that gained the most attention, the elimination of the dividend, is a step taken to help address this "mountain of debt" and confirms the importance of this issue.
The approach employed in this series of articles was to create a forecasting model to be able to project how much cash will be generated over the upcoming five year period to determine whether Frontier can "keep up" with the maturities. As part of that evaluation, a forecast for 4Q'17 was made, published in the referenced earlier article and again provided here:
