AT&T CEO:Time Warner deal on track for year-end close

Despite President Trump's disdain for Time Warner's (NYSE:TWX) cable network CNN, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson (NYSE:T) remains confident the $85 billion deal will get done.

"We continue to expect the Time Warner deal to close by year-end and further transform the company” said Stephenson in the company's latest earnings statement released late Tuesday.

While President Trump has been critical of several media organizations, claiming many report "Fake News", CNN has been a frequent lightening rod. Earlier this month in a Twitter post featured the President body slamming CNN with the #FraudNewsCNN.

His public criticisms have raised speculation that he could influence the deal's fate among regulators as detailed in a recent Vanity Fair article.

Ticker	Security	Last	Change	Change %
TWX	NO DATA AVAILABLE	-	-	-
T	AT&T INC.	23.18	+0.20	+0.87%

Stephenson's comments came as the telecom giant reported second-quarter profit of $3.92 billion.  The Dallas-based company said it had profit of 63 cents per share. Earnings, adjusted for one-time gains and costs, were 79 cents per share.

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The results topped Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of 20 analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 74 cents per share.

The telecommunications company posted revenue of $39.84 billion in the period, also exceeding Street forecasts. Nineteen analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $39.8 billion.

AT&T shares have decreased 15 percent since the beginning of the year, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index has increased 11 percent. In the final minutes of trading on Tuesday, shares hit $36.20, a decline of 16 percent in the last 12 months.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on T at https://www.zacks.com/ap/T