Although AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) reported late last evening that its fiscal first-quarter profit rose 3.2% thanks to continued expansion in wireless subscribers’ base, shares edged down about 1.5% as telecommunication giant’s revenue fell short of Street’s expectation.
Adjusted earnings however were in-line with analysts’ consensus forecast.
The Dallas, Texas-based telecommunication giant, which has witnessed consistent sequential quarterly revenue growth in the recent past due to rapid proliferation of smartphone usage, has been losing out to its rival Verizon Wireless in terms of subscribers’ growth as America’s two biggest wireless companies compete with each other to attract more customers.
In the recently concluded quarter, AT&T added 296,000 subscribers, who entered in a long-term service contract compared to 187,000 additions in the year-earlier period and 780,000 in the fourth quarter of last fiscal. In contrast, Verizon Wireless reported last week that it added 677,000 new subscribers compared to 501,000 in the same quarter of last year.
For the fiscal first quarter, the wireless carrier reported a net income of $3.7 billion or 67 cents a share compared to $3.58 billion or 60 cents a share, in the same quarter of last year. Excluding onetime items, adjusted earnings stood at 64 cents a share up from 59 cents a share, in the year-earlier period.
Revenue contracted 1.5% to $31.36 billion.
Analysts were expecting earnings of 64 cents a share on revenue of $31.75 billion.
The churn rate, number of subscribers leaving wireless carrier’s network, declined to 1.04% from 1.1% in the year-earlier quarter and $1.19 from the preceding quarter.
While revenue from wire-line segment fell 1.8%, revenue from wireless division, including equipment sales climbed 3.4%.
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Post Written By: Ed Liston
Ed Liston is a senior contributing editor at TheStockMarketWatch.com. An active market watcher and investor, Ed guides an independent team of experienced analysts and writes for multiple stock trader publications. He is widely quoted in various financial publications on the Internet. When Ed is not writing about stocks, investing in stocks, talking about stocks, or otherwise doing something stock related, he likes to go sailing and fishing in his yacht.
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