Raymond James analysts upgraded their rating on AT&T stock to outperform from market perform. On Friday, analyst Frank Louthan indicated in a note to clients that a sanguine outlook on AT&T earnings’ positive growth coupled with the telecom giant’s deleveraging efforts could lead to its shares outperforming.We believe that the combination of positive earnings growth and delivering over the course of the year will being investors back to AT&T", Louthan mentioned in the note. Louthan also set price target of $34 per share, which is around +12% higher compared to the stock's previous closing price. Last week, AT&T shares trembled after the company announced a major revamp of its DirecTV Now streaming service, including a hike in package prices.

On Wednesday, the company announced the details of the launch. Verizon said that Chicago and Minneapolis would be the first cities to get its next-generation wireless technology for mobile phones starting April 11.Later on in the year, Verizon expects to make 5G accessible to users of Samsung Galaxy S10 5G and LG’s V50 ThinQ as well. Prices start at $85 a month for the base Go Unlimited plan.

WarnerMedia announced a new organizational model and leadership team Monday in hopes of advancing its content development. The Wall Street Journal reported that "significant layoffs" are expected at the company as part of the reorganization, citing sources. The reorganization comes just days after Richard Plepler announced in an internal memo obtained by CNBC that he would step down from his role as HBO CEO.READ MORE...

HBO Chief Executive Richard Plepler will leave the premium television network owned by U.S. wireless carrier AT&T Inc after nearly 28 years at the company, Plepler said in a memo to HBO employees on Thursday. Read More...

After a 15-month attempt by the Trump administration to block AT&T’s $85.4 billion purchase deal with Time Warner, the company emerged victorious -- the U.S. Justice Department declared it would not fight an appeals court approval of the deal. President Trump has been critical of this acquisition because he saw it helping Time Warner’s CNN unit, which he accused of disseminating fake news. However, this accusation by the government was deemed unpersuasive by the three judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, resulting in approval of the deal. In an era of Netflix (NFLX) and Google (GOOGL) that allows access of content with no need for cable subscription, the merger is a turning point as it sets the stage for the No.2 wireless carrier to integrate its WarnerMedia business as well as its new Xandr advertising unit. The merger, which was announced in October 2016, closed on June 14, 2018, shortly after U.S. District Judge Richard Leon r

CenturyLink Inc. slashed its shareholder dividend by more than half, causing its stock price to tumble around -9.4% Thursday. The wireless telecom company’s board agreed to lower yearly dividend to $1 from $2.16 – something that the company expects would free up cash for facilitating its debt repayment.As of Dec. 31, its long-term debt stood at $35.4 billion (compared to $20 billion of shareholder equity). Along with announcing the dividend cut, CenturyLink also reported its fourth quarter adjusted earnings of 37 cents a share – which is substantially higher than the year-ago quarter’s 18 cents.

Two landmark cases involving the Shenzhen-based hardware giant Huawei take big steps forward in the coming weeks, as the Trump administration weighs an executive order that may further curtail the ability of American companies to use telecom equipment manufactured in China. Read More...

Therefore, it's difficult to assess whether those efforts involve just one or two cell sites or sites that span a full city. T-Mobile’s launch timeline is relatively close with that of its rivals, like AT&T (T) and Verizon (VZ), with the former already having launched mobile 5G service in 12 cities.Sprint and Verizon too have promised mobile 5G launches with smartphones in the coming months. T-Mobile's 5G plans are noteworthy because the operator is the only major wireless network provider that is planning to launch 5G services on 600MHz spectrum.

AT&T (T) closed the most recent trading day at $30.40, moving +1% from the previous trading session.Meanwhile, the Dow gained 0.51%, and the Nasdaq, a tech-heavy index, added 0.42%. READ MORE...

AT&T (T - Get Report) is planning to hand walking papers to employees in at least 10 operations centers around the country, according to a report by Vice's Motherboard. The reported cuts come as AT&T puts the final wraps on its $85 billion merger with Time Warner, with such corporate combinations often spawning efforts to cut costs and eliminate redundancies. READ MORE...

Adding 1 million customers in the fourth quarter, T-Mobile US Inc. exceeded Wall Street expectations on net new phone subscribers who pay a monthly bill.Analysts estimated the number to be 857,900, according to research firm FactSet. The percentage of subscribers who leave a service provider was 0.99 percent for the mobile carrier in the fourth quarter, down from 1.02 percent in the quarter ended September 30. Even in the third quarter, T-Mobile’s net new phone subscribers (along with its profit) had edged past analysts' estimates,on the back of its competitive wireless plans and trade-in offers for iPhones.

AT&T is preparing for yet another significant round of layoffs according to internal documents obtained by Motherboard.The staff reductions come despite billions in tax breaks and regulatory favors AT&T promised would dramatically boost both investment and job creation.

Verizon Communications Inc. added wireless subscribers for seven straight quarters. According to preliminary fourth-quarter results released Tuesday,  the largest U.S. wireless carrier added 1.2 million regular monthly customers in the holiday quarter. Chief Executive Officer Hans Vestberg has been focusing on 5G technology and other wireless segments, after the company’s not-so-smooth ride with its Yahoo and AOL businesses in recent times.The company has embarked on a four-year, $10 billion cost-cutting plan, which included cutting 10,400 jobs through a buyout program last month.

For the second time in just four months, the $26 billion proposed merger between T-Mobile and Sprint has been put on hold after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) suspended most of its operation owing to a funding lapse.  With the deal already getting the required approvals from CFIUS as well as cabinet agencies, FCC approval is the only major remaining hurdle for the successful closure of the deal. Review of the proposed merger deal between the third and the fourth-largest U.S. wireless carriers was picked up by the FCC on the 3rd week of June, but then the review process was put on hold on September 11 after the companies submitted new documents.

To the relief of many Verizon customers who had feared a football playoff blackout, Verizon and Disney in a joint statement on Sunday announced that both companies have reached a broad-based distribution agreement. Verizon, as per its current contract with Disney, is responsible for the distribution of various Disney-owned channels such as ESPN and ABC stations - like New York City’s WABC to its ~4.6 million subscribers.But the company faced a December 31 deadline just in time for the renewal of the contract, failure to which would have deprived more than 4.5 million Fios TV customers -- especially the millions of football fans’ access to the big playoff games like college football games on New Year’s Day and one of the NFL wild-card playoff games. Although the details of the agreement are yet to be disclosed, this last-minute deal has helped end a high-stakes dispute over programming fees that threatened to drop Disney’s programming from the Fios TV network. The dispute became publ

Verizon will continue to broadcast Disney content, with the two companies reaching “a broad-based distribution agreement” as announced by them. Verizon Fios’ contract to carry programming from Disney Media Networks, including ESPN, and Disney-owned ABC stations, was scheduled to expire at year-end.But Sunday’s agreement on programming fees will now allow Fios’ 4.5 million TV subscribers to access Disney channels. The two companies said about the deal,  “details will be released in the coming days.”  

The daily chart on Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ) is an interesting one for a number of reasons.The second item of interest is the regression line for the last nine months and the stock’s relationship with that regression line. The middle blue line is the regression line.

T-Mobile and Sprint seem to be inching closer to their $26 billion merger. Late Monday, T-Mobile released a statement mentioning that the wireless operators have received approval on their proposed merger from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Defense have withdrawn an earlier request to postpone the deal, as revealed by T-Mobile’s statement. However, the companies still await some other approvals (such as, antitrust approval from the Justice Department and the Federal Communications Commission) before the deal can get finalized. If the T-Mobile-Sprint deal goes through, it would see the third and fourth largest wireless carriers in the U.S. joining forces to compete with AT&T and Verizon.

Intense competition in digital advertising space is apparently the cause behind weakening revenue and thinning profit of the business segment, leading Verizon to slash the value of its AOL & Yahoo assets by $4.6 billion. The move by the telecom giant is estimated to wipe out almost half of the value of its ‘Oath’ division (which includes AOL, Yahoo, the Huffington Post and other businesses).Last month, the company indicated that Oath would be renamed ‘Verizon Media Group/Oath’ as part of a broader restructuring plan. The revision in Oath’s value leaves its goodwill balance (i.e.

This is part of the telecom behemoth’s plan to streamline operations, especially to focus more on developing its 5G services. The company first publicly put forward this plan in September, with a goal to save $10 billion in cash by 2021.The plan was offered to 44,000 employees across Verizon’s business segments.  "These changes are well-planned and anticipated, and they will be seamless to our customers," CEO Hans Vestberg said in a statement.