Crown Castle Closes 9% Higher as SpaceX Eyes 80,000 Cell Sites

Crown Castle shares closed just over 9% higher Friday, the day after a report on SpaceX’s effort to gain access to at least 80,000 U.S. cell sites for a planned mobile service.

The stock stood at $85.97 as of 4:34 p.m. ET (20:34 UTC), up $7.14 from the previous close. Trading volume topped three times its average for the past month.

SpaceX is pursuing cell sites as it builds ground infrastructure for a mobile service based on Starlink and low-band spectrum. Crown Castle is among the companies in discussions with SpaceX, but the 80,000-site target does not mean those sites have been secured through agreements. Crown Castle owns and leases about 40,000 U.S. cell towers, providing antenna space and related facilities to wireless carriers through long-term leases. The companies’ discussions are covered in TokenPost’s report on SpaceX’s cell-site target.

Crown Castle shares climbed as much as 10% in late trading Thursday. AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile shares fell around 5% that day as SpaceX’s plans raised the prospect of a new nationwide competitor.

Crown Castle’s third-quarter site-rental revenue declined 4.5% from a year earlier. The company lifted its 2026 forecast midpoint for that revenue by $20 million to $3.875 billion, which remains 4% below its 2025 total of $4.049 billion. The results and updated outlook are detailed in TokenPost’s coverage of Crown Castle’s third-quarter results.