What happened
Shares of Windstream Holdings (WINMQ) dropped by 10.8% last month, according to data provided by S&P Global Market Intelligence, after an analyst at JP Morgan downgraded the company's shares from Neutral to Underweight.
So what
Investors were already fleeing Windstream after the company's tumultuous 2017. The regional telecom company missed nearly all of Wall Street's earnings consensus estimates last year and caught investors off guard when it eliminated its dividend in late 2017. All of that caused Windstream's stock to fall nearly 75% last year, and that carried over into January with JP Morgan's downgrade.
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Analyst Philip Cusick said that the company will face near- and long-term problems as it tries to fight off increasing competition from cable and satellite competitors. Cusick believes the competition could end up taking up to 60% of Windstream's current customers.
Investors had clearly already been cooling to Windstream's stock, and the analyst's comments continued to erode hope that the company is on the right path.
Now what
Windstream's shares have continued to slide this month and have already fallen by about 5% as of this writing. The company's management said it was optimistic about Windstream's future on its third-quarter earnings call back in November -- but investors are having a hard time buying the growth story that Windstream's leadership is selling.
