One of AT&T’s most important services to the operating telephone
companies is financial assistance. This is especially true in periods of
rapid growth, like the present. In these times the telephone companies
need vast sums of money for equipment and buildings to expand and
strengthen the nation’s communications network for defense, and to meet
the public demand for telephone service.
The money for improving and expanding telephone service comes from
people in all walks of life. It comes from the savings of the many, not
the wealth of the few. Most of this money is invested in securities of
the AT&T Company, which in turn supplies funds to the operating
companies.
By mid-1955 AT&T was owned by about 1,375,000 people. These owners live
in all parts of the country, in large cities, small towns and rural
areas. They are truly a cross-section of America.
Many AT&T share owners are long-time investors. More than a fourth of
them have owned their AT&T stock ten years or more. And over 60 per cent
of these have increased their investment during those ten years.
About 351,000 of the shareholdings represent two persons—husbands and
wives, mothers and daughters, sisters and brothers—who have invested
savings in their joint names.
Besides the direct owners of AT&T, many other people—such as insurance
company policy holders and bank customers—help indirectly to finance the
business through the AT&T shares held by organizations and trustees. The
largest AT&T shareholder is a nation-wide investment firm that holds
stock for thousands of customers. Among other institutional holders are
some 2,100 churches, 1,100 hospitals and homes, over 1,000 schools and
libraries, over 500 foundations and charities.
[Illustration: DISTRIBUTION OF A. T. &. T. SHARE OWNERS END OF 1954]
608,000 WOMEN Average Holding 29 Shares
351,000 JOINT ACCOUNT Average Holding 26 Shares
297,000 MEN Average Holding 38 Shares
51,000 TRUSTEES AND ORGANIZATIONS Average Holding 194 Shares
More than 200,000 Bell System employees own AT&T stock purchased under
payroll sayings plans. Many of these, together with other employees, are
now buying shares under the current payroll sayings plan.
Such widespread ownership by investors helps make possible the good
telephone service you get today.