By Katherine Hamilton

Lumen Technologies shares fell after a report that the company is in talks to sell its fiber business to AT&T.

The stock fell 14% to $4.22 on Tuesday afternoon. Shares have lost a quarter of their value during the past three months but are up nearly threefold over the year.

The telecommunications companies are discussing the sale of Lumen's fiber business and have valued it at $5.5 billion, according to a Tuesday report from Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter.

As of the fourth quarter, Lumen's fiber broadband had 1.1 million subscribers, according to its quarterly report.

When asked at a conference earlier in March about selling the fiber business, Chief Financial Officer Christopher Stansbury said Lumen is focusing on enterprise technology, which includes networking and security.

He said consolidation of the fiber industry is accelerating as there is more convergence between fiber-to-home and wireless. Lumen was "not going to be a consolidator," he added.

As more providers bundle those offerings, it's more difficult to keep adding customers, Stansbury said.

"It's definitely an asset that has garnered a great deal of interest," he said of the fiber business. "It's the largest asset that's out there today that hasn't been claimed."

Write to Katherine Hamilton at katherine.hamilton@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 25, 2025 15:49 ET (19:49 GMT)

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