AT&T says third-quarter consensus revenue estimates 'inflated'

(Reuters) - AT&T Inc said on Wednesday that consensus revenue estimates for its third-quarter were "inflated" as they differed from its own accounting, which includes results from DirecTV, acquired by the No. 2 U.S. wireless carrier in July.

Shares of AT&T, which is scheduled to report results on Thursday, fell as much as 1.3 percent after the Wall Street Journal first reported that the company's revenue for the quarter could fall short of market expectations.

AT&T's shares closed down 0.4 percent at $33.60.

"It is clear many revenue estimates for DirecTV include the full month of July. Under GAAP we are only allowed to include revenue beginning July 25," AT&T spokesman Brad Burns told Reuters. "This is a one-time variance as analysts sort through some of the normal modeling of an acquisition," Burns added.

AT&T said in September that it would change the methodology DirecTV used to count its commercial subscribers to conform to its practices, which would reduce DirecTV's total subscriber count by 918,600 at the close of the deal.

(Reporting By Lehar Maan in Bengaluru; Editing by Ted Kerr)