AT&T Eats Verizon's Lunch

Both AT (NYSE: T) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) are dealing with consumers who have become less willing to upgrade their smartphones and more willing to switch wireless providers. For Verizon, this has led to elevated churn and chronic subscriber losses.

AT has also seen churn tick up a bit, but not nearly as much as Verizon. And while AT's subscriber growth has cooled, the company is still winning over customers. Verizon lost 136,000 net consumer wireless retail postpaid phone subscribers during the second quarter, while AT gained 326,000.

AT also fared far better in the prepaid phone arena. While Verizon shed 304,000 net prepaid subscribers in the second quarter, AT tacked on 123,000. AT offers prepaid plans directly and through its subsidiary Cricket, and the company noted that Cricket managed "substantially lower" churn than the 2.5% rate for the prepaid business as a whole.

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Source Fool.com