In a stunning announcement that will make Adam Smith believers proud, AT&T and Verizon appear to be feeling the effects of more intense market forces as an emboldened T-Mobile and Sprint offer more appealing bang for the buck to consumers.
At an investor conference Tuesday morning, AT&T CFO John Stephens admitted that the company's fourth quarter “churn,” or turnover rate to other cellular providers, would be higher than it was a year earlier, even as its net subscriber count continues to grow. Stephens cites aggressive promotions from T-Mobile and Sprint in forcing his company's hand. Remember a few months ago when AT&T up and offered 30GB of data across four lines for $100 a month? That would have been inconceivable a year ago.
For its part, Verizon has also cited the “highly competitive and promotion-filled” fourth quarter as an area for concern. The mobile provider is still doing well, overall, but it finds itself spending more money each quarter to retain its customer base.
Q4 earnings won't be reported until January, but it appears the financial gurus at Big Red and AT&T are prepping shareholders for some potentially disappointing news.
And now one cannot help but wonder how much AT&T is kicking itself over the stillborn T-Mobile acquisition. All carriers create some form of competition, but locking up the GSM market would have been a game changer for AT&T, though potentially awful for the rest of us. As a consumer, you might want to consider sending the FCC a Christmas basket this year.
Source: BGR
Yeah, I’d squirm too
The one thing at&t can do is unlock the boot loaders on their phones. They are the only carrier I can think of that locks the boot loaders.
Verizon and AT&T both do this actually in most cases.
P.T. Barnum was right – there is a sucker born every minute.