AT&T announced quarterly financial results yesterday that it said modestly exceeded analysts' expectations, amid signs that the trends that have devastated parts of its business, if not getting better, are at least not growing worse. Both AT&T's consumer and business-services operations are still shrinking because of continued weakness in the company's core long-distance telephone market. CEO: "Given ongoing weakness in the economy and instability among some players in the telecommunications industry, I'm pleased with our second-quarter results. We continue to execute with purpose and integrity." AT&T would have to assume the risk of trying to sell billions of dollars' worth of shares in Time Warner Cable at a time when the stock market generally, and cable stocks in particular, are taking heavy losses. And AT&T would not have full flexibility in deciding when to try to mount such a sale. (I don't suppose that retirees will have much luck trying to exchange their shares of "purpose and integrity" for vegetables at the grocery store.) The fates of AT&T and AOL Time Warner are intertwined in the Time Warner Entertainment deal. It is going to cost both of them dearly to extricate themselves from the enterprise. Nobody wants to own a cable business these days; seems it's just not profitable. But then, what is profitable these days? AT&T, Writing Down Cable Assets, Posts Big Loss | 
