Verizon Posts Profit, Revenue That Edge Expectations
Verizon Communicationsreported earnings and revenue that edged Wall Street targets on Thursday.
The mobile service provider posted first-quarter earnings excluding items of 59 cents per share, compared with 51cents a share a year ago.
Net income was $1.69 billion, up from $1.44 billion in the year-earlier period.
Revenue came in at $28.24 billion, outpacing the $26.99 billion it reported in revenue a year ago.
Analysts had expected the company to report earnings excluding items of 58 cents a share on $28.18 billion in revenue, according to a consensus estimate from Thomson Reuters.
On Thursday, shares of the stock rose 1 percent in premarket trading. (Click here to get real-time quotes for Verizon.)
Holiday sales of Apple's iPhone 4S started to boost Verizon's revenue in the latest quarter, as subscribers settled in to paying their new monthly bills.
That meant that wireless service revenues grew at their fastest pace in three years at Verizon Wireless. The country's largest cellphone company started selling the iPhone 4 a bit more than a year ago, but sales got a big boost when the 4S model was released in October.
