What does all this mean? Comparative analysis of AT&T's top three competitors show that in some respects, AT&T is doing rather okay and in other respects, needs considerable attention. In general, AT&T is not in the best situation. If AT&T is experiencing low figures, how do investors determine how AT&T stock will react with market movements? Considering the financial fluctuations of AT&T's revenues, determining how the AT&T's stock price will react to market movements is based fortunately on their Beta score. "Beta is a measure of how a stock's returns have historically responded to movements in overall market" (Schwab 2003). The current market's beta value is at 1.0 and AT&T has a beta of 0.9. Companies that have betas greater than 1.0 are riskier than the market but they do really well when the market is good and rather poorly when the market is down.
Since the stock issuance of DoCoMo and obtaining long term debts from credit facility, one may wonder the future trends of the company. Since historic trends are best indicators of future trends, it can be estimated that in 2004, AT&T will have an annual EPS trend of $1.53 which is a considerable increase based on this year's performance of negative $15.13.
(chart)