By Will Feuer

AT&T's core cellphone business kept growing in the third quarter, lifting revenue and spurring the company to raise its full-year outlook for free cash flow.

Shares, down about 22% so far this year, rose almost 4% to $14.85 in premarket trading.

In the third quarter, the Dallas company added 468,000 postpaid phone connections, the cell carrier's main profit engine. Wall Street analysts surveyed by FactSet expected the company to add about 403,000 of those kinds of subscribers.

The cell carrier's quarterly earnings were dented by severance and restructuring charges. The company has been consolidating offices as part of a plan to cut costs across the company.

AT&T is the first telecommunications heavyweight to report third-quarter results. Verizon and T-Mobile are set to offer their own updates next week.

Here is how AT&T did in the third quarter:

Revenue: Third-quarter revenue rose 1% to $30.4 billion, above the $30.21 billion that Wall Street analysts expected, according to FactSet.

Adjusted profit: Stripping out one-time items, adjusted earnings were 64 cents a share vs. 62 cents a share expected.

Free cash flow: AT&T posted third-quarter free cash flow of $5.2 billion, up from $3.8 billion a year ago.

Outlook: AT&T says it is on track to hit roughly $16.5 billion in free cash flow this year, above the company's prior outlook of at least $16 billion.

Write to Will Feuer at will.feuer@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 19, 2023 08:07 ET (12:07 GMT)

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