Topic: Growth Stocks

AT&T INC. $30 – New York symbol T

AT&T INC. $30 (New York symbol T; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 5.9 billion; Market cap: $177.0 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.4; Dividend yield: 5.9%; TSINetwork Rating: Average; www.att.com) gets 50% of its revenue from its 103.2 million wireless customers. The other 50% mainly comes from its 39.0 million telephone clients and 16.4 million high-speed Internet users.

The company recently cancelled its plan to buy rival wireless carrier T-Mobile from Germany’s Deutsche Telekom AG; AT&T felt that competition regulators would have blocked the deal.

As a result, AT&T will pay Deutsche Telekom a $4-billion breakup fee, consisting of $3 billion in cash and $1 billion of wireless spectrum. That’s partly why AT&T’s earnings fell 80.1% in 2011, to $3.9 billion, or $0.66 a share. In 2010, it earned $19.9 billion, or $3.35 a share. Without unusual items, earnings per share would have fallen 3.9%, to $2.20 from $2.29.

Revenue rose 2.0%, to $126.7 billion from $124.3 billion. The company saw gains in Internet (up 7.4%) and wireless (up 6.0%). However, revenue from regular phone services fell 11.3%.

Demand for new smartphones should push up AT&T’s earnings to $2.34 a share in 2012. The stock trades at just 12.8 times that estimate. The company also recently raised its dividend by 2.3%. The new annual rate of $1.76 yields 5.9%.

AT&T is a buy.

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