VZ

Verizon is the textbook income-and-value telecom: the stock trades at 11.5x FY2025 diluted EPS ($4.06) and just 1.4x sales, while throwing off $37.1B of operating cash flow against ~$17B of capex (per MD&A) for roughly $20B of free cash flow. That comfortably funds the $11.5B dividend (≈$2.73/share, ~5.9% yield), which still leaves room for the brand-new $25B buyback the Board authorized on January 30, 2026 — a genuine shift after Verizon repurchased zero shares in both 2024 and 2025. Profitability is solid for a utility-like business: 21.2% operating margin, 12.4% net margin and 16.2% ROE, with retained earnings building to $94.7B and cash ballooning to $19.0B (up 354%). At this price and yield, the downside is well-supported.

But the growth story is thin, and that is what holds this back from a buy. Consolidated revenue rose just 2.5% to $138B and net income actually fell 1.9% to $17.2B — and the five-year history shows income stuck in the $17-22B band with a sharp 2023 air-pocket to $11.6B, so this is a no-growth-to-low-growth earner. The MD&A confirms a two-speed business: Consumer carried the quarter at +3.8% to $106.8B (fueled by wireless and fixed-wireless-access broadband), while the Business segment shrank 1.6% to $29.1B, signaling secular erosion in the enterprise/wireline base. The filing also flags the core problem of the model — strategy 'requires significant capital investments primarily to acquire wireless spectrum' and fiber, including $17.0B in 2025 — so this is a capital-treadmill business where the dividend, not earnings growth, is the return.