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BellSouth misses mark
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July 23, 2001: 1:45 p.m. ET
Telecom says 2Q results miss lowered forecasts; cuts yearly guidance
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - BellSouth Corp. reported second-quarter earnings Monday that missed lowered Wall Street expectations and cut its earnings guidance for the year due to trouble with business sales.
Atlanta-based BellSouth, the No. 3 U.S. local phone company, reported second-quarter earnings of $973 million, or 52 cents a share, before one-time items, compared with $1.06 billion, or 56 cents a share, a year ago. Analysts polled by earnings tracker First Call expected the company to earn 53 cents a share.
BellSouth said the soft economy hurt sales to business customers more than sales to homes. The economy dampened advertising sales in its directory publishing unit, and curtailed growth in Cingular Wireless, the company told analysts in a conference call.
As a result, BellSouth cut its earnings outlook to $2.25-to-$2.30 a share. Excluding foreign-exchange currency losses, earnings are expected to rise by a range of 5 percent-to-7 percent, to about $2.30-to-$2.35 a share.
BellSouth in March said it expected full-year profit growth of 7 percent-to-9 percent, with earnings of $2.35 to $2.40 a share. Wall Street analysts had expected $2.29 a share, according to First Call.
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For the most recent quarter, the company's domestic wireless revenue totaled $1.4 billion. It added 273,000 cellular and personal communications services wireless customers, below the 286,000 customers it added in the year-ago second quarter. Average revenue per subscriber fell 14.8 percent to $52 a month. BellSouth said these results reflect its 40 percent ownership stake in Cingular Wireless, which ended the quarter with 21.2 million customers.
In June, BellSouth warned its quarterly earnings would miss consensus expectations at the time of 58 cents a share, blaming the weakening value of Brazilian and Colombian currencies.
Second-quarter revenue rose to $7.37 billion from $6.76 billion a year ago. 
-- from staff and wire reports
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BellSouth
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