| From: Sr K | 12/13/2019 7:25:33 PM | | | | | | 2% Dividend increase, goes ex div 1/10/2020, pays February 3.
Will buy back $100M debt over 2020.
More detail from Google
AT&T's board of directors today approved a 2% increase in the company's quarterly dividend. The dividend is payable on Feb. 3, 2020, to stockholders of record at the close of business on Jan. 10, 2020. AT&T's quarterly dividend will increase from $0.51 per share to $0.52 per share. |
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| From: Jon Koplik | 1/29/2020 12:58:56 PM | | | | | | Barrons -- AT&T’s Earnings Hit the Stock. Focus on the 3-Year Plan ................................
Jan. 29, 2020
AT&T’s Earnings Hit the Stock. Focus on the 3-Year Plan.
By Nicholas Jasinski
AT&T ended 2019 on a mixed note, with slight misses on revenue and steep subscriber losses at DirecTV, but having met debt-reduction goals and reiterated its 2020 outlook. The greater challenge lies ahead, as the telecom and media conglomerate aims to meet ambitious targets it has set for itself over the next three years.
Investors were uninspired by the results, sending AT&T stock (ticker: T) down 2.6% Wednesday morning. The S&P 500 was up 0.4%.
Before the market opened, AT&T reported 89 cents in adjusted earnings per share for the fourth quarter, a penny ahead of analyst expectations and up from 86 cents a year earlier. Revenue came in at $46.8 billion, about equal to analysts’ forecast and down from $48.0 billion in the year-earlier quarter. AT&T’s adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization, or Ebitda, fell to $14.4 billion, from $15 billion last year. Wall Street consensus had been for $14.7 billion in adjusted Ebitda.
Investments in HBO Max -- a forthcoming direct-to-consumer streaming service from AT&T’s WarnerMedia division -- weighed on AT&T’s results because of $1.2 billion in foregone content-licensing revenue. HBO Max will debut this spring, entering a crowded market at a premium price of $14.99 a month.
AT&T’s weakest division remained DirecTV. The company’s Entertainment Group had 945,000 TV-subscriber cancellations in the fourth quarter, versus analysts’ forecast for a 739,000 loss but better than a nearly 1.2 million drop a quarter earlier. That brought AT&T’s total cord-cutters to more than 4 million in 2019 -- or about 17% of its subscriber base.
That translated to a drop in revenue from 2018. But because many of the departing customers were on promotional plans that weren’t profitable for AT&T to begin with, the company managed to hold Entertainment Group Ebitda steady from 2018 to 2019one of its stated goals for the year.
Another target of AT&T management for 2019 was to reduce its leverage to 2.5 net debt to Ebitda or below. It ended the year with $151 billion in net debt -- much of it acquired to fund the purchase of Time Warner -- and a ratio of 2.547. About $18 billion in asset sales last year helped fund much of the debt reduction.
AT&T’s wireless-phone business is the strongest and most important part of its portfolio, and it outperformed on the subscriber front in the fourth quarter. The company added 229,000 postpaid wireless phone customers in the fourth quarter, while it gained a net 135,000 overall postpaid subscribers -- meaning those who pay a monthly bill. Analysts had been looking for 129,000 new postpaid phones and a loss of 13,000 overall postpaid subscribers. AT&T added just 8,000 prepaid customers, however, versus Wall Street consensus for 83,000 net new prepaid accounts.
Total wireless-service revenue increased 1.8% year over year, but both sales and Ebitda came in slightly below consensus expectations.
AT&T’s remaining business -- wireline, Latin America and WarnerMedia segments were about flat in the fourth quarter versus a year earlier -- with the HBO Max investment weighing on the media division.
Overall, AT&T generated $29 billion in free cash flow in 2019, up 30%. It paid out about half of that in the form of dividends, and bought back about 56 million shares.
“Coming into 2019, we laid out a detailed plan for the year,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said on the company’s earnings call Wednesday morning. “That plan was a series of specific steps necessary to exit 2019 on a path of sustained growth…We met or exceeded every single one of those objectives, and the road map is set for the next three years.”
Management reaffirmed its 2020 guidance for revenue growth of 1% to 2% and adjusted earnings per share of $3.60 to $3.70. That would be a 1% to 4% increase over 2019’s $3.57. Chief Operating Officer John Stankey said on the earnings call that AT&T had 50 million people covered by 5G already, and expects to have a nationwide network by the second quarter. That is using largely mid-band spectrum, which propagates further from its antenna but has slower data speeds than higher frequencies. AT&T has mmWave 5G live in 35 cities, and plans to add more in 2020.
Chief Financial Officer John Stephens said AT&T had bought back 85 million shares in the first quarter and planned to repurchase 20 million more this quarter. It has a target to retire 250 million shares in 2020.
Activist hedge fund Elliott Management disclosed a large stake in AT&T last fall and advocated to the company’s board for several changes to its operations, capital allocation and acquisition strategies. In response, AT&T announced a three-year plan that included new targets for earnings, shareholder returns, cost reduction, and profit margins. It also committed to not making any major acquisitions and to leadership tweaks down the road.
“Today’s report offers little to assuage concerns about the company’s competitive position in most of its businesses,” Bernstein analyst Peter Supino wrote Wednesday morning. “With Elliott Management having quickly influenced the company’s financial and governance plans, the ‘paid to wait’ case for AT&T is interesting.”
The Elliott involvement boosted AT&T’s shares in the fall. They have returned 36% including dividends over the past year through Tuesday’s close. That is ahead of peers and the S&P 500, which had returned 24%. T-Mobile US (TMUS) and Verizon Communications (VZ) had returned 17% and 16%, respectively. AT&T stock sports a 5.4% dividend yield.
Write to Nicholas Jasinski at nicholas.jasinski@barrons.com
Copyright © 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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| To: Jon Koplik who wrote (4235) | 1/29/2020 1:46:50 PM | | From: robert b furman | | | | HI Jon,
I've accumulated a large size position in T as a dividend Aristocrat over the last 2- 21/2 years. I've sold far out in time money with the hope of getting them assigned to me, and they have been.
T has reduced debt, increased free cash flow,and now is reducing the shares issued when acquiring Time Warner.
When they have bought back the shares issued, T will have gobbled up an 85 billion acquisition and will have a huge cash flow, all while building the biggest and fastest 5G nationwide system.
This is a monster of a company slowly doing all the things right.
My favorite number was the dividend payout dropped below 50%(46%).
That's quite a very safe reliable dividend yield that is yielding 6.34% in my account.
Additionally I like the sale of preferred stock yielding 5%.
I'm not buying the preferred, as I think this will fund the stock repurchase plan,which will benefit the price of the common.
I thought the drop in price today was unjustified.
Randall Stephenson is a much underrated CEO IMO.
His goals for the company are very conservative and have a superior track record of being achieved.
HBO max is the big question mark to me.
The track record of the management group makes me think that the launch will be surprisingly powerful.
A library of content twice the size of HBO now - is a significant statement from today's webcast.
A very nice solid company that offers an excellent dividend yield that is solid and a share buyback program that will soon put the price of T starting with a 4 IMO.
Good to see posters here at this incredibly GREAT American Company.
Bob |
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| From: Sr K | 3/20/2020 2:47:03 PM | | | | | | T is dropping its plan to buy back $4 billion in stock over the next three months as the coronavirus pandemic reignites criticism of Fortune 500 companies' repurchasing practices.
Just change the amount to buying back debt instead of equity. |
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| To: Sr K who wrote (4237) | 3/20/2020 2:51:32 PM | | From: robert b furman | | | | Hi Senior K,
Stocks would be the deal. Bonds would be expensive with rates so low.
I suppose they could issue new bonds and buy back old debt with higher rates.
Kicking out debt term in a low rate environment would be good too.
Bob |
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| From: Sr K | 4/24/2020 11:06:31 AM | | | | | | WSJ today
11:02 AM
AT&T Inc. Chief Executive Randall Stephenson said he will retire at the end of June, handing leadership of one of the world’s largest media and telecommunications companies to longtime deputy John Stankey.
Mr. Stephenson said he will remain chairman of the Dallas company until January, when the company is expected to elect an independent chairman. The change was announced at the company’s annual meeting Friday, which was held online because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Mr. Stephenson, who turned 60 this week, has spent most of his 13 years as chairman and CEO piecing together a modern media company by scooping up DirecTV and then Time Warner, remaking the staid telephone company he inherited.
He had been preparing to retire in 2020 until an activist investor surfaced late last year challenging his strategy, according to people familiar with the matter.
His exit comes after the company reached a truce with the activist investor, Elliott Management, which had been pushing for a strategic review of assets and questioned Mr. Stankey’s elevation to succeed Mr. Stephenson. Last year, AT&T promoted Mr. Stankey, then the head of its media unit, to No. 2 role as chief operating officer.
After reaching a truce with Elliott, AT&T said Mr. Stephenson would stay at the helm through this year.
AT&T said the leadership change came after a five-month search process overseen by the company’s independent board members, which evaluated external and internal candidates. Mr. Stephenson said the board began its succession planning in 2017 and the decision to promote Mr. Stankey was unanimous. |
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| From: Sr K | 5/23/2020 12:41:49 PM | | | | | | AT&T
AT&T Told to Stop Using ‘5G Evolution’ in Marketing
Company says a self-regulatory group’s finding doesn’t apply to its 5GE icon
CFO Journal
May 20, 2020 7:27 pm ET
wsj.com
AT&T Inc. will stop using the slogans “5G Evolution” and “5G Evolution, The First Step to 5G” in its marketing after losing an appeal with a self-regulatory group, but suggested that it will continue to display “5GE” icons on customers’ phones.
T-Mobile US Inc. had successfully challenged AT&T’s “5G Evolution” marketing with the National Advertising Division unit of BBB National Programs, prompting an appeal by AT&T.
But the National Advertising Review Board, the appellate body for BBB National Programs’ ad self-regulation program, agreed with the earlier finding.
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AT&T disagrees with the reasoning but will comply with the ruling as a supporter of the self-regulatory process, a spokesman said. BBB National Programs is an independent nonprofit organization that focuses on industry and business self-regulation. The group separated in 2019 from the Better Business Bureau, which primarily addresses relationships between businesses and their customers.
Asked whether AT&T will keep showing “5GE” on phones, the spokesman said the decision only applies to its ads.
The company has previously argued that it introduced the 5G Evolution idea as a first step in the transition to the next generation of wireless networks.
Telecom companies have been battling to convince customers that each will be first with nationwide 5G, which they say will offer much faster speeds, and have contested rivals’ assertions on the subject.
AT&T previously challenged claims in two commercials from Verizon Communications Inc. that said Verizon is “building the most powerful 5G experience for America.” The National Advertising Division last week said Verizon should discontinue the claim because the company hadn’t produced supporting evidence.
Verizon is appealing a portion of the decision.
Sprint Corp. in February 2019 sued AT&T over its 5G marketing, alleging false advertising. The lawsuit was settled in April 2019, according to a spokeswoman for T-Mobile, which closed its takeover of Sprint last month. She declined to elaborate. |
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| From: Sr K | 8/6/2020 9:33:52 PM | | | | | | 6:49 PM
T-Mobile TMUS US Inc. said it vaulted ahead of rival AT&T Inc. T in the race for wireless customers to become the country’s second-largest cellphone carrier.
The Bellevue, Wash., company ended June with 98.3 million U.S. customers, excluding wholesale subscribers on other brands that use its network. AT&T reported 92.9 million prepaid and postpaid customers, a tally that didn’t count wholesale accounts or connected devices such as Wi-Fi hotspots and car sensors. T-Mobile included non-phone gadgets like wireless hotspots in its reported customer base.
Despite the different reporting policies, T-Mobile was long expected to climb the wireless rankings after it closed its merger with rival Sprint in April. The merger effort prevailed after a more than two-year battle with regulators and antitrust enforcers that culminated in a federal antitrust trial brought by a coalition of state officials. The transaction created a larger mobile service provider with a market value topping $100 billion controlled by German parent company Deutsche Telekom AG .
“We’re staring down Verizon with our sight set on the No. 1 spot,” T-Mobile Chief Executive Mike Sievert said Thursday during a videoconference with financial analysts. Verizon Communications Inc. ended June with 119.9 million wireless connections, a figure that also counted smartwatches, tablets, and other machines aside from smartphones.
T-Mobile’s second-quarter results showed it also weathered the coronavirus pandemic better than its competitors, adding 253,000 postpaid phone customers during the period. Investors place a higher value on postpaid customers—who are billed for service after it is rendered—than on prepaid plans subject to more customer switches. |
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