Were Verizon's (VZ) Fiber TV Subscriptions Inflated?

In a suit filed in U.S. District Court, an advertising agency has charged Verizon (VZ) with inflating the number of FiOS fiber-to-the-home subscriptions that it has by adding "pending" customers to the count.

According to The Wall Street Journal "Digital Art Services Inc., an advertising company based in Great River, New York, charged Verizon with fraud."

Verizon is in the process of spending $23 billion to put its fiber network so it will pass 18 million homes. The company is gambling much of its future on being able to compete with cable companies for voice, broadband, and TV service. In June, the company added its one-millionth FiOS subscriber. A senior official at Comcast (CMCSA) recently noted the competition with the big telecom was heating up.

Verizon does not need to be viewed as having fuzzy subscription numbers. It has too much on the line. No pun intended.

Douglas A. McIntyre