AT&T reported a loss of USD 0.68 per share for the fourth quarter, hurt by one-time charges for pensions. Excluding one-time items and the sale of its advertising unit, EPS rose 10 percent to USD 0.44. Revenues edged up 0.2 percent to USD 32.6 billion, and AT&T said they were up 2.8 percent excluding the divestment and the impact from Superstorm Sandy. Adjusted operating profit was little changed year-on-year at USD 4.2 billion, and the margin was at 12.9 percent.
Over the full year, AT&T grew operating cash flow to USD 39.2 billion, up from USD 34.7 billion in 2011. Capital expenditures fell slightly, to USD 19.7 billion from USD 20.3 billion, but included a 10.6 percent increase in mobile-related spending.
For 2013, AT&T forecast revenues up over 2 percent, led by mobile and the fixed consumer activities; EPS growth in the upper-single digits or higher; stable margins, with higher profitability in mobile offsetting its Project VIP investments; capital spending of around USD 21 billion with LTE coverage expanded to over 250 million people; and free cash flow of over USD 14 billion.
At the mobile activities, quarterly revenues rose 5.7 percent year over year to USD 17.6 billion, including a 4.2 percent increase in service revenues. Data revenues rose 14.7 percent to USD 6.8 billion, with growth limited by the launch of the Mobile Share plans, which now count 6.6 million customers, AT&T said. Operating profit fell 1.2 percent to USD 2.6 billion, hurt by higher costs after a record 10.2 million smartphones sold in the quarter and the storm impact after some customers were credited for disrupted services.
The mobile customer base rose by 1.1 million in the three months to 107.0 million at year-end. This included postpaid net adds of 780,000, 246,000 new connected devices, reseller net adds of 234,000 and a net loss of 166,000 prepaid lines.At the wireline division, revenues fell 0.5 percent from a year ago to USD 14.9 billion, while operating profit improved 1.8 percent to USD 1.8 billion, thanks to lower costs. Consumer revenues rose 3.0 percent to USD 5.5 billion, the strongest improvement in four years, AT&T said.
Growth was led by the U-verse services, where AT&T added 192,000 TV customers in the three months for a total 4.5 million and 609,000 internet subscribers, for a total 7.7 million. This helped offset losses from DSL, and for the first time, the company had more U-verse internet subscribers than DSL users.
Business revenues fell 2.1 percent to USD 9.1 billion, but improved 0.6 percent versus Q3.
