American Tower (AMT) Risk Analysis

Our use of TRSs enables us to engage in non-REIT qualifying business activities. Under the Code, no more than 20% of the value of the assets of a REIT may be represented by securities of one or more TRSs and no more than 25% of the value of the assets of the REIT may be represented by non-qualifying assets (including securities of one or more TRSs). This limitation may hinder our ability to make certain attractive investments or take advantage of acquisition opportunities, including the purchase of non-qualifying assets, the expansion of non-real estate activities and investments in the businesses to be conducted by our TRSs, and to that extent limit our opportunities and our flexibility to change our business strategy. Further, as a REIT, we must distribute to our stockholders an amount equal to at least 90% of our REIT taxable income (determined before the deduction for distributed earnings and excluding any net capital gain). To meet our annual distribution requirements, we may be required to distribute amounts that may otherwise be used for our operations, including amounts that may otherwise be invested in future acquisitions, capital expenditures or repayment of debt. As no more than 25% of our gross income may consist of dividend income from our TRSs and other non-qualifying types of income, our ability to receive distributions from our TRSs may be limited, which may impact our ability to fund distributions to our stockholders or to use income of our TRSs to fund other investments. In addition, the majority of our income and cash flows from our TRSs are generated from our international operations. In many cases, there are local withholding taxes and currency controls that may impact our ability or willingness to repatriate funds to the United States to help satisfy REIT distribution requirements.

Our operations are subject to various federal, state, local and foreign environmental and occupational safety and health laws and regulations, including those relating to the management, use, storage, disposal, emission and remediation of, and exposure to, hazardous and non-hazardous substances, materials and wastes. As the owner, lessee or operator of real property and facilities, including generators, we may be liable for substantial costs of investigation, removal or remediation of soil and groundwater contaminated by hazardous materials, and for damages and costs relating to off-site migration of hazardous materials, without regard to whether we, as the owner, lessee or operator, knew of, or were responsible for, the contamination. We may also be liable for certain costs of remediating contamination at third-party sites to which we sent waste for disposal, even if the original disposal may have complied with all legal requirements at the time. Many of these laws and regulations contain information reporting and record keeping requirements. We may not be at all times in compliance with all environmental requirements. Further, our data center properties are subject to various federal, state and local regulations, such as state and local fire and life safety regulations and ADA federal requirements. We may be subject to potentially significant fines or penalties if we fail to comply with any of these requirements. The requirements of the environmental and occupational safety and health laws and regulations are complex, change frequently and could become more stringent in the future. In certain jurisdictions, these laws and regulations could be applied retroactively or be broadened to cover situations or persons not currently considered. It is possible that these requirements will change or that liabilities will arise in the future in a manner that could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations or financial condition. While we maintain environmental and workers' compensation insurance, we may not have adequate insurance to cover all costs, fines or penalties.

Our leverage and debt service obligations could have significant negative consequences to our business, results of operations or financial condition, including: - requiring the dedication of a substantial portion of our cash flow from operations to service our debt, thereby reducing the amount of our cash flow available for other purposes, including capital expenditures and REIT distributions;- impairing our ability to meet one or more of the financial ratio covenants contained in our debt agreements or to generate cash sufficient to pay interest or principal due under those agreements, which could result in an acceleration of some or all of our outstanding debt and the loss of the towers securing such debt if a default remains uncured;- limiting our ability to obtain additional debt or equity financing, thereby placing us at a possible competitive disadvantage to less leveraged competitors and competitors that may have better access to capital resources, including with respect to acquiring assets; and - limiting our flexibility in planning for, or reacting to, changes in our business and the markets in which we compete. We may need to raise additional capital through debt financing activities, asset sales or equity issuances, even if the then-prevailing market conditions are not favorable, to fund capital expenditures, future growth and expansion initiatives, required purchases of our partners' interests and to satisfy our distribution requirements and debt service obligations and leverage requirements, including financial ratio covenants. An increase in our total leverage could lead to a downgrade of our credit rating below investment grade, which could negatively impact our ability to access credit markets or preclude us from obtaining funds on investment grade terms, rates and conditions or subject us to additional loan covenants, which could accelerate our debt repayment obligations. Further, certain of our current debt instruments limit the amount of indebtedness we and our subsidiaries may incur. Additional financing, therefore, may be unavailable, more expensive or restricted by the terms of our outstanding indebtedness. Further, market volatility and disruption caused by factors such as inflation, rising interest rates and supply chain disruptions may impact our ability to raise additional capital through debt and equity financing activities or our ability to repay or refinance maturing liabilities, or impact the terms of any new obligations, which in turn may have an adverse impact on our credit ratings. The Federal Reserve Board began to raise interest rates in March 2022 for the first time in over three years, and increased the federal funds rate on four occasions during 2023. Such rate increases have corresponding impact to our costs of borrowing and may have an adverse impact on our ability to raise funds through the offering of our securities or through the issuance of debt due to higher debt capital costs, diminished credit availability and less favorable equity markets. The extent to which these factors will impact our business and financial results will depend on future developments, which are highly uncertain and cannot be predicted at this time due to the rapid evolution of this uncertain situation.

As we continue to acquire and build communications sites and other communications infrastructure assets, including data center facilities and related assets, in our existing markets and expand into new markets, we are subject to a number of risks and uncertainties, including not meeting our return on investment criteria and financial objectives, increased costs, assumed liabilities and the diversion of managerial attention. Achieving the benefits of acquisition and platform expansion initiatives depends in part on timely and efficient integration of operations, telecommunications infrastructure assets and personnel. Integration may be difficult and unpredictable for many reasons, including, among other things, portfolios without requisite permits, differing systems, cultural differences, conflicting policies, procedures and operations or with incomplete information. Significant acquisition-related integration costs, including certain nonrecurring charges such as costs associated with onboarding employees, integrating information technology systems, acquiring permits and visiting, inspecting, engineering and upgrading tower sites or other communications infrastructure assets, could materially and adversely affect our results of operations in the period in which such charges are recorded or our cash flow in the period in which any related costs are actually paid. Some of our acquired portfolios have included sites that do not meet our structural specifications, including sites that may be overburdened. In these cases, beyond additional capital expenditures, general liability risks associated with such portfolios will exist until such time as those portfolios are upgraded or otherwise remedied. In addition, integration may significantly burden management and internal resources, including through the potential loss or unavailability of key personnel. Our international expansion initiatives are subject to additional risks, such as those described above, as well as our ability to comply with bribery and anti-corruption laws such as the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (the "FCPA") and similar local laws. Moreover, we may fail to successfully integrate the assets we acquire or fail to utilize such assets to their full capacity. If we are not able to meet these integration challenges, we may not realize the benefits we expect from our acquired portfolios and businesses, and our business, financial condition and results of operations will be adversely affected. We must safeguard our customers' infrastructure and equipment located in our data centers and ensure our data centers remain operational at all times. Problems at one or more of our data centers, whether or not within our control, could result in service interruptions or significant infrastructure or equipment damage. These could result from numerous factors, including limited power availability and grid distribution constraints due to current high demand, human error, equipment failure, physical, electronic and cybersecurity breaches, fire, earthquake, hurricane, flood, tornado and other natural disasters, extreme temperatures, water damage, fiber cuts, power loss, terrorist acts, sabotage and vandalism, global pandemics or health emergencies and failure of business partners. We have service level commitment obligations to substantially all of our data center customers. As a result, service interruptions or significant equipment damage in our data centers could result in difficulty maintaining service level commitments to these customers and potential claims related to such failures. Because our data centers are critical to many of our customers' businesses, service interruptions or significant equipment damage in our data centers could also result in lost profits or other indirect or consequential damages to our customers. In addition, any loss of service, equipment damage or inability to meet our service level commitment obligations could reduce the confidence of our customers and could consequently impair our ability to obtain and retain customers, which would adversely affect both our ability to generate revenues and our operating results. Furthermore, we are dependent upon internet service providers, telecommunications carriers and utility providers, some of which have experienced significant system failures and outages in the past. Our customers may in the future experience difficulties due to system failures unrelated to our systems and offerings. If, for any reason, these providers fail to provide the required services, our business, financial condition and results of operations could be adversely impacted. As a result of our acquisitions, we have a substantial amount of intangible assets and goodwill. In accordance with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States ("GAAP"), we are required to assess our goodwill and other intangible assets annually or more frequently in the event of circumstances indicating potential impairment to determine if they are impaired. If, as a result of the factors noted above, the testing performed indicates that an asset may not be recoverable or the carrying value exceeds the fair value, we would be required to record a non-cash impairment charge in the period the determination is made. Our platform expansion initiatives may not be successful, or we may be required to record impairment charges for our goodwill or for other intangible assets, which could have a material adverse effect on our business, results of operations or financial condition, and could limit our continued investments in such platform expansion initiatives.

The development and implementation of new technologies designed to enhance the efficiency of wireless networks or changes in a customer's business model could reduce the need for tower-based wireless services, decrease demand for tower space or reduce previously obtainable lease rates. In addition, if the industry trends toward deploying increased capital to the development and implementation of new technologies, then customers may allocate less of their budgets to leasing space on our towers. Examples of these technologies include more spectrally efficient technologies, which could relieve a portion of our customers' network capacity needs and, as a result, could reduce the demand for tower-based antenna space. Additionally, certain small cell complementary network technologies or satellite services could shift a portion of our customers' network investments away from traditional tower-based networks, which may reduce the need for carriers to add more equipment at certain communications sites. Moreover, the emergence of alternative technologies could reduce the need for tower-based broadcast services transmission and reception. Further, a customer may decide to cease outsourcing tower infrastructure or otherwise change its business model, which would result in a decrease in our revenue and operating results. Similarly, our data center site infrastructure may become antiquated due to the development of new systems that deliver power to, or eliminate heat from, the servers and other customer equipment that we house or the development of new technology that requires levels of power and cooling density that our facilities are not designed to provide. Our failure to innovate in response to the development and implementation of these or other new technologies or changes in a customer's business model could have a material adverse effect on the growth of our business, results of operations or financial condition. Conversely, we may invest significant capital in technologies, platform expansion initiatives or new additions to our core business that may not provide expected returns or profitability, which could divert management attention and have a material adverse effect on our operating results. Additionally, our customers may overestimate or overvalue the benefits and use of 5G networks and other new technology that are deployed onto our communications sites that, in turn, could adversely affect our customers' growth, thereby adversely affecting our growth.

Our communications real estate portfolio includes towers that we operate pursuant to lease and sublease agreements that include a purchase option at the end of the lease period. We may not have the required available capital to exercise our right to purchase the towers at the end of the applicable period, or we may choose, for business or other reasons, not to do so. If we do not exercise these purchase rights, and are unable to extend the lease or sublease or otherwise acquire an interest that would allow us to continue to operate these towers after the applicable period, we will lose the cash flows derived from the towers.