• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, December 9, 2019

In a post on its website, AT&T announced that it's set to raise DirecTV and U-verse prices again.

Starting January 19, DirecTV packages will increase by between $1 (for its Basic Choice plan) and $8 (for its Premier plan).

Other package price changes include $3 hikes for Mas Latino, Optimo Mas and Preferred Choice; $4 for Select, Select Classic, Select Choice, Entertainment and Entertainment Classic; $5 for Choice, Total Choice, Total Choice Unlimited, Mas Ultra and Familiar Ultra; and $7 for Choice Xtra Classic, Preferred Xtra, Xtra and Ultimate.

U-verse will raise prices by between $3 and $7 per month.

As noted by TVAnswerman, which first spotted and reported on AT&T’s online post, DirecTV has lost nearly 3 million subscribers since AT&T acquired it in 2015.

In the third quarter of 2019 alone, DirecTV lost an estimated 1.1 million (U-verse and AT&T Now lost 104,000 ad 195,000, respectively), per Leichtman Research — by far the largest cumulative paid sub loss among the major providers.  

DirecTV raised its prices by between $1 and $8 per month this past January. It also raised prices by between $2 to $6 per month in 2017 and by between $2 and $8 in 2018.

AT&T again cited rising carriage agreement costs for the upcoming price increases.

But in addition to those cost increases, AT&T made a strategic decision to focus on acquiring and retaining more profitable subscribers. AT&T is under investor pressure, and is prepping to launch a new streaming service, AT&T TV, next year.

Comcast and Spectrum have also recently announced price hikes.