AT&T profit, revenue jump

SAN ANTONIO (AP) -- AT&T, the nation's largest telecommunications company, on Tuesday reported net income of $3.1 billion in the third quarter, a 42 percent jump from the previous year before its acquisition of BellSouth was completed.

The profit, which amounted to 50 cents per share, compared with $2.2 billion earned the July-September period last year. The year-earlier earnings worked out to 56 cents a share because the company had fewer shares outstanding.

Revenue nearly doubled to $30.1 billion in the third quarter from $15.6 billion a year earlier.

Excluding costs and accounting effects of major acquisitions, the company's earnings per share would have been 71 cents, in line with what analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial expected.

Although most of the dramatic quarterly gains were the result of the completed merger, AT&T (Charts, Fortune 500) reported continued growth in its wireless revenue, the segment of the business company executives have said will lead it into the future.

It added 2 million subscribers in the first full quarter since the introduction of Apple's (Charts, Fortune 500) iPhone, giving it 65.7 million subscribers total, the report said.