Executives at America`s largest telephone providers are making bold predictions that the ongoing bleeding of local fixed-line telephone subscribers will plateau and possibly even begin to taper off in the near future.

Big telecom carriers have lost a lot of fixed-line customers over the last couple of years, as cable operators use VoIP technology to launch their own digital voice services, and many customers cut all the cords so to speak, and use cell phones exclusively.

“Our expectation would be that in 2007 that we don’t see a worsening access-line loss situation,” stated AT&T`s Chief Financial Officer, Rick Lindner, while trying to boost investor confidence at a recent meeting.

Qwest and Verizon have made similar statements in the past few weeks, signaling a shift towards optimism about the all-important core telephone market. Executives claim that by adding fiber optic television to their service bundles and increasing broadband speeds, they are slowly but surely building customer loyalty and dealing with the problem. The epidemic of cord cutting is also slowing down, according to many industry insiders.