Creative Investment Research Warns AT&T Rollback Undermines Market Integrity

WASHINGTON - Dec. 15, 2025 - PRLog -- Creative Investment Research® (CIR), an independent economic research and investment advisory firm, today issued a formal warning regarding AT&T's decision to dismantle its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs as part of its effort to obtain regulatory approval for a major corporate transaction.

CIR's concerns are grounded in more than three decades of direct experience advising major corporations—including AT&T—on the identification, evaluation, and engagement of minority- and women-owned financial institutions. As early as 1992, CIR conducted comprehensive institutional research for AT&T assessing the financial strength, capital adequacy, regulatory compliance, and execution capability of minority- and women-owned broker-dealers and investment banks to support inclusive and prudent capital-markets participation.

"These programs were never symbolic," said William Michael Cunningham, Founder of Creative Investment Research. "They were grounded in rigorous financial analysis and fiduciary responsibility. AT&T itself once understood that inclusion strengthens markets rather than weakens them."

Over its history, Creative Investment Research has provided similar research and performance analysis for leading corporations and institutions, including The Walt Disney Company, Washington Gas Light Company, The Boston Companies, Diversity Inc. Magazine, and Pacific Gas & Electric Company. CIR has also been responsible for evaluating, developing, and managing investment portfolios that significantly outperformed benchmark indices over long periods.

CIR pioneered the Fully Adjusted Return (FAR®) Methodology, a framework integrating financial and social data to evaluate economic performance and systemic risk. Using this methodology, CIR warned the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as early as 2003 and again in 2006 of the growing probability of system-wide economic and market failure—years before the 2008 financial crisis.

"Rolling back DEI programs to satisfy political or regulatory pressure introduces measurable risks," Cunningham added. "It reduces competition, increases concentration risk, weakens supplier resilience, and ultimately undermines long-term shareholder value."

From a capital-markets perspective, CIR cautions that eliminating transparent inclusion mechanisms in procurement, contracting, and workforce development undermines market efficiency and economic stability—particularly in industries as capital-intensive and infrastructure-dependent as telecommunications.

Creative Investment Research urges AT&T, federal regulators, institutional investors, and policymakers to ensure that merger approvals and regulatory decisions do not incentivize the abandonment of accountability, transparency, or fair access to economic opportunity. CIR continues to provide independent, data-driven analysis to regulators and stakeholders to ensure that decisions made today do not produce long-term economic harm.

About Creative Investment Research

Creative Investment Research (CIR) is an independent economic research and investment advisory firm specializing in capital markets, risk analysis, and inclusive economic measurement. CIR pioneered the Fully Adjusted Return (FAR®) Methodology and has advised corporations, regulators, courts, and institutional investors on financial performance, systemic risk, and economic equity for more than 30 years. https://creativeinvest.com/