AT&T, Inc. Earnings In Line With Estimates, Sales Miss

AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) released its fourth quarter earnings report after closing bell tonight, posting adjusted earnings of 63 cents per share, which is in line with the consensus estimate and $42.1 billion, a 33% increase which was mostly due to the DIRECTV acquisition and came up short of the consensus of $42.75. The company posted 55 cents per share in earnings and $34.4 billion in revenue in the previous year’s fourth quarter.

AT&T Earnings – solid subscriber growth in 2015

Reported earnings were 65 cents per share for the fourth quarter.

AT&T added 2.8 million wireless subscribers and 1.6 million branded subscribers. The company also expanded its 4G LTE network coverage to 355 million POPs. It also added 2.2 million U.S. wireless subscribers, recording gains in all categories, and saw a postpaid churn rate of 1.18% with a total churn rate of 1.5%. In Mexico, AT&T added 638,000 wireless branded subscribers.

Business Solutions service revenues for 2015 declined “slightly” year over year, with strategic business services revenues climbing 10.3% to $2.8 billion. The company added 214,000 DIRECTV subscribers in the U.S., although total video subscribers fell slightly. AT&T also added 192,000 total IP broadband subscribers.

“Our DIRECTV integration is going well, and the customer response to our new integrated mobile and entertainment offers is strong,” said AT&T Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Randall Stephenson in a statement. “Throughout this year, we plan to launch a variety of new video entertainment packages that give customers even more choices. We’re also seeing terrific results from our expansion into the Mexican mobile market. Our LTE network now covers 355 million people and businesses, and in the quarter we had 2.8 million wireless net additions.”

AT&T provides guidance

For the full year 2016, AT&T management expects revenue growth in the double digits and adjusted earnings per share growth of at least the mid-single digits. They expect margins to remain stable while ramping investments in Mexico and to record about $22 billion in capital spending.