AT&T Slumping Near 7-Year Low

AT&T Inc. (T) raised its quarterly dividend by a penny in Friday's pre-market, but the news has failed to attract buying interest. The apparent apathy isn't surprising because the stock is glued to a seven-year low despite recent upgrades from Citigroup, Cowen, JP Morgan and boutique firm MoffettNathanson. This laggard behavior raises all sorts of red flags, predicting even lower prices in the coming months.Remaining bulls hope that the investing public eventually notices Wall Street's newfound love for the perennial underperformer, allowing the stock to play catch-up with improving metrics. We won't find out if they're right until at least January because the communications giant has been an intensely bad performer in 2018, down more than 23% year to date, raising the odds for tax-selling pressure into year end. The stock posted fabulous gains in the 1980s and 1990s after the 1982 Baby Bell breakup opened up all sorts of new growth opportunities. It posted an all-time high at $59.94 in January 1999 and sold off to the low $30s at the turn of the millennium. A 2000 breakout attempt failed, while the subsequent downturn completed the last leg of a double top pattern that broke to the downside in 2002.Selling pressure eased in the first quarter of 2003 after the decline held support at the 1994 low in the upper teens. That marked the lowest low in the next five years, ahead of a limp recovery effort that escalated in 2006, reaching a six-year high in the lower $40s at the October 2007 top. The stock gave up those gains during the 2008 economic collapse, dropping into a successful test at the 2003 low, and bounced back above $30 in 2011.