Stock Performance Review Basics: AT&T (T)

There are several methods for choosing a stock to purchase. You can buy a stock based on a recommendation, you can buy a stock based on products that you use, or you can buy a stock based on a gut feeling. Whatever method you use to select the stocks that you want to buy, you should never buy a stock without knowing at least the basics about the company and its past performance.

What AT&T Does

One of the first things that you should learn about the stock that you are interested in is what the company does. In the case of AT&T the answer is fairly straight forward. AT&T is a telecommunications company. While this description is adequate enough to give you an idea of what the company does, it is also a good idea to delve slightly deeper into the AT&T portfolio to find out what type of telecommunications this company works with. The answer is that AT&T works with residential and business telecommunications including local phone service, long distance, Internet access, as well as voice and data services.

52 Week AT&T (T) Stock Performance

During the 52 week period that ended 08/22/06 AT&T’s stock, represented by the stock symbol T, fluctuated between 21.79 and 31.16 per share. On 08/22/06 the value of T ranged between 30.52 and 30.83. This shows that T has been able to maintain a higher valuation at the end of this period of examination. While daily fluctuations are normal and expected, stock experts have predicted that T will continue to increase in value over the next 52 weeks and climb to an expected value of 32.04 within the year.

Historical T Performance – The Last Five Years

T has seen peaks and valleys over the last five years. It experienced its last major peak back in 2001. Then between 2001 and 2003 the stock decreased in value. This could have been due to an increase in competition that T faced with a rash of wireless and Internet based phone services popping up. However between 2003 and 2006 the value of T has continued to regain its former value, slowly, but steadily.