AT&T’s CFO to Retire, With WarnerMedia Executive Taking Job

(Bloomberg) -- AT&T Inc. Chief Financial Officer John Stephens will retire in March after nearly a decade as the company’s top accountant, with WarnerMedia finance chief Pascal Desroches stepping in as his replacement.

Desroches will serve as senior executive vice president of finance until he assumes the CFO role on April 1, AT&T said in a statement Tuesday.

The move reflects Chief Executive Officer John Stankey’s ongoing efforts to integrate the company’s media business and focus on core areas, including wireless, fiber-optic broadband and the HBO Max streaming service.

Desroches had been a finance executive with Time Warner Inc., which AT&T acquired in 2018 for $85 billion. Since that deal closed, the company has been trying to weave together the media giant with its telecom operations, leading to executive reshufflings and job cuts. Stankey had overseen the WarnerMedia division before being appointed to the CEO role in July.

“Pascal is an impressive financial executive whose strategic thinking and leadership I’ve seen firsthand at WarnerMedia,” Stankey said in a statement.

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