AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) is in the spotlight after senior executive vice president of external and legislative affairs Bob Quinn had the following to say about Congress controversially repealing a regulation that would have stipulated ISPs to get permission from consumers before selling their various data:
Given the Beltway reaction to the commendable work by Congress to reverse the FCC’s off-course privacy rules, it’s worth taking a step back to see what’s really going on. First and foremost, all of the rhetoric that asserts – without any factual support – that the CRA vote suddenly eliminated consumer privacy protections is just plain wrong. The reality is that the FCC’s new broadband privacy rules had not yet even taken effect. And no one is saying there shouldn’t be any rules. Supporters of this action all agree that the rescinded FCC rules should be replaced by a return to the long-standing Federal Trade Commission approach…
AT&T’s privacy protections are the same today as they were five months ago when the FCC rules were adopted. We had the same protections in place the day before the Congressional resolution was passed, and we will have the same protections the day after President Trump signs the CRA into law. The Congressional action had zero effect on the privacy protections afforded to consumers
AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) sells internet to many Americans and would benefit if it could sell more consumer data (most Americans hope that the data will be aggregated and anonymous however, rather than specific. In that regard, Quinn’s blog post didn’t address that point).
What Does The Smart Money Sentiment Say?
At Insider Monkey, we’ve developed an investment strategy that has delivered market-beating returns over the past 12 months. Our strategy identifies the 100 best-performing funds of the previous quarter from among the collection of 700+ successful funds that we track in our database, which we accomplish using our returns methodology. We then study the portfolios of those 100 funds using the latest 13F data to uncover the 30 most popular mid-cap stocks (market caps of between $1 billion and $10 billion) among them to hold until the next filing period. This strategy delivered 39.7% gains over the past 12 months and outperformed the 24.1% gain enjoyed by the S&P 500 ETFs. Our enhanced small-cap hedge fund strategy returned more than 45% over the last 12 months and outperformed SPY by more than 30 percentage points over the last 4.5 years (see details here).
Of the 742 elite funds we track, 48 funds owned $2.79 billion of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) and accounted for 1.10% of the float on December 31, versus 51 funds and $2.55 billion respectively on September 30.
The Bottom Line
AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) is in the spotlight after it defended itself, saying that its privacy protections are basically still the same as before. For more reading, check out the ‘11 Best Virtual Reality Games For iPhone‘.
Follow At&T Inc. (NYSE:T)
Follow At&T Inc. (NYSE:T)
Disclosure:None
Ken Wolter / Shutterstock.com
