Essay Sample on AT&T Stock Falls: Reasons Behind Deterioration to $32

Introduction

The stock as AT&T Company has been underperforming with a significant deterioration noticed from $41 to $32 (Team 2019). The primary reasons behind the decline include the uncertain performance of the wireless business, headwinds in the pay-TV market in the United States, and uncertainty in regulations. Importantly, the merger between Sprint and T-mobile has a role to play in increasing competition in the wireless mobile industry (Team 2019). Also, the pay-TV business in the company has witnessed poor performance over the years since customers are dropping those services for cheaper options. On that note, this paper proposes some solutions on a research strategy that AT&T Company can implement to solve the issue of deteriorating stock prices.

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By solving the issues faced at AT&T Company, the institution needs to consider dealing with the intensive competition. As already mentioned, the increased rivalry is the primary reason behind the underperformance at the organization. The most suitable solutions are the creation of customization and structural bonds. According to Lowenstein (2015), a customization bond is the designation of a product in a way that meets the unique needs of the consumers. AT&T could acquire data from the consumers by asking them to provide their views on the needs that the company should meet.

Structural bond, as Lowenstein (2015) defined, refers to a situation where a firm makes it hard for a customer to exit a firm by not purchasing the products offered. By enhancing payments through the internet or offering at-home services, for instance, customers would appreciate the efforts made in the company such that exiting would be a challenge. In addition to that, the company could form structural bonds by collecting data from the customers on their areas of satisfaction and dissatisfactions. All these forms of data collection methods could be in the form of interviews or questionnaires.

Conclusion

To conclude, this paper proposes customization and structural bonds as possible solutions to the issues of stock deterioration and underperformance facing AT&T Company. Importantly, the customization and structural bonds would help the firm to deal with the problems of competition. More so, it would prevent customers from exiting the firm due to better and cheaper options in other organizations.

References

Lowenstein, M 2015, 'Strategic customer brand-bonding: building personalized value and loyal behaviour through obsessive focus, discipline, and innovative and engaging communication', Journal of Creating Value, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 108-118, http://doi.org/10.1177/2394964315569636 [Accessed March 12, 2020]

Team, T 2019, Why Has AT&T's Pay TV Business Been Underperforming Its Rivals?, Forbes, https://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2019/06/24/why-has-atts-pay-tv-business-been-underperforming-its-rivals/#7ca0966d5bcd [Accessed March 12, 2020]