Inter Miami's owners pile up power-line work as their telecom business slips

Power lines now lead MasTec's booked work

Jose Mas, Inter Miami's co-owner and MasTec's chief executive, reported Oct. 29 that the company's booked power-line work had risen 74% in a year. MasTec is the Coral Gables builder he and his brother Jorge run, and the club's new stadium is one of its jobs. Its telecom business, once about as big as power lines, has fallen behind.

Why it matters: MasTec's work booked for the next year and a half reached a record $24.5 billion at Sept. 30, the company says. The two brothers hold nearly a quarter of its shares, by our arithmetic from its proxy. Shares entered the report down about 36% from the open after the July report, Earnings Whispers reported.

Power-line work now makes up more than a third of the booked total, up from under a third a year ago, by our arithmetic. Telecom fell to about a fifth, from nearly a third.

The booked work, line by line

Power Delivery, the segment that builds and maintains transmission and distribution lines, had $8.9 billion of backlog at Sept. 30. That compares with $5.1 billion a year earlier, the company's quarterly report shows. Communications, its wireless and fiber work, held at about $5.1 billion. Clean energy and infrastructure work rose to $8.3 billion, and pipeline work to $2.3 billion.

Power Delivery was narrowly the largest segment a year ago, too, and clean energy led at the end of June. The shift is in the shares of the total: power lines rose to about 36% from about 31%, and telecom fell to about 21% from about 30%, by our arithmetic.

The segment serves the energy, utility and data center industries, the report says. Its revenue rose 65% to $1.84 billion in the quarter. The report names "higher levels of project activity," including transmission and distribution work, as the main reason. It also cites "data-center related electrical infrastructure project work, including contributions from the recently acquired Superior business."

The July purchase

On July 20 MasTec bought The Superior Group, an electrical contractor with about 3,000 employees. It paid $1.2 billion in cash, after cash it acquired, plus 1,219,498 MasTec shares and a three-year earn-out with no maximum payment, the quarterly report says. Its table puts the total at about $1.83 billion in cash, stock and an estimated earn-out.

Superior's backlog was $1.8 billion at Sept. 30, MasTec's chief financial officer, Paul DiMarco, said on the Oct. 30 call. Power Delivery's backlog rose about $3.8 billion in a year, so Superior's own backlog equals about half of that gain, by our arithmetic. Part of it was booked after the purchase: Earnings Whispers puts Superior's backlog at $1.4 billion when MasTec bought it.

Acquisitions added about $480 million of Power Delivery's revenue growth in the quarter, and the existing business about $244 million, the report says. That makes about two-thirds of the segment's growth bought, by our arithmetic.

Telecom and pipelines slowed

Communications revenue fell 11.8% to $807 million, and its EBITDA, a profit measure before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, fell 47.6%, the release shows. In Communications "we saw certain customers defer spending in the second half of 2026," Jose Mas said.

Pipeline revenue rose 21.1% to $724 million, but the segment's earnings fell 18.4%. "Permitting related access delays on certain Pipeline projects impacted margins, as crews and equipment were underutilized," he said.

Total revenue was a record $5.2 billion, up about 30%. Investing.com reported that analysts had expected $4.94 billion. Profit per share under standard accounting fell 7.7% to $1.89. The company's adjusted figure rose 19.3% to $2.96, a penny under the $2.97 analysts expected, Investing.com reported, and the shares fell 2.9% after the report.

The company expects about $18.3 billion of revenue for 2026. It reports four business segments with revenue and five reportable segments in all.

The Mas brothers, the company and the club

Jorge Mas has worked at MasTec or its predecessor since 1979 and has chaired its board since 1998, the proxy says. His brother Jose R. Mas is chief executive and a director. Jorge Mas holds 15.0% of MasTec's shares and Jose Mas 7.8%. The proxy calls Jorge Mas "Managing Owner of the Miami Major League Soccer franchise, Inter Miami CF." He spent three years negotiating to bring Lionel Messi to the club, he told ESPN in 2023.

MasTec builds for the club, too. Its quarterly report says it does construction for "a professional Miami soccer franchise" in which the brothers are majority owners, including a soccer facility and a stadium due to be finished by the end of 2026. That work brought MasTec about $50.9 million of revenue in the first nine months of 2026, with about $20.5 million owed to it at Sept. 30.

The report lists other ties. MasTec leases aircraft from a company Jorge Mas owns and paid about $4.3 million under those leases in nine months. It also paid about $6.7 million to a subcontractor whose minority owners include a company the brothers control.

MasTec gave Friends of Byron Donalds PAC $125,000 on Sept. 4 and $125,000 on Oct. 2, state records show. No record we read ties the checks to any MasTec business.

Their side

On the Oct. 30 call, Jose Mas said MasTec had been "awarded approximately 2,100 miles of fiber constructions related to hyperscaler activity," the giant data center operators, with construction expected "to begin around the middle of 2027." DiMarco said "Superior has been really collaborative, bringing our traditional utility resources on the data center campuses."

What's next

What's next: MasTec expects the brothers' stadium to be finished by the end of 2026, the quarterly report says. Its new fiber work is set to start around the middle of 2027, Jose Mas said.

Sources we read

MasTec Inc., third-quarter 2026 release (Form 8-K, Exhibit 99.1) and Form 10-Q, Oct. 29, 2026. MasTec 2026 proxy statement, April 9, 2026. The Motley Fool, transcript of MasTec's Oct. 30 call. Investing.com (Luke Juricic) via Yahoo Finance, Oct. 29. Earnings Whispers, Oct. 30. Inter Miami CF release on the Mas brothers' and David Beckham's ownership. ESPN, July 3, 2023. Bloomberg Línea, Sept. 6, 2023. Florida Division of Elections, contributions to Friends of Byron Donalds PAC from MasTec, read Nov. 3.