(Telecompaper) AT&T has lowered its annual revenue growth outlook to 3-4 percent, from 5 percent previously. The company blamed the downgrade on divestments, such as its Connecticut wireline assets sold to Frontier, an exit from low-margin wireline wholesale businesses and fewer customer additions for AT&T Next, its handset upgrade programme. For the third quarter, the US operator posted revenues up 2.5 percent year-on-year to USD 33.0 billion. Operating profit fell to USD 5.4 billion from USD 6.2 billion a year ago, hurt by higher costs for the integration of Leap and Alltel and the proposed takeover of DirecTV. Excluding these costs, the operating margin was 17.2 percent. Net profit fell to USD 3.0 billion or 58 cents a share, from USD 3.8 billion or 72 cents a share a year ago. Adjusting for USD 0.03 of the previously mentioned merger and integration-related expenses and USD 0.02 of costs for early debt redemption, EPS was USD 0.63, compared to USD 0.66 in the year-ago quarter. Cash from operating activities totaled USD 8.7 billion in the third quarter, and capital expenditures reached USD 5.2 billion.