Its basic double entry accounting practice what they are doing. They get to take a loss on the phone and thus have a write off, while breaking that loss up over the contract term of the service, which in turn leaves you with a different entry for your account which has a value assigned to it also divided up. Therefore on their statements, they DO show a profit EVERY month, which they in turn filter into quarterly reports released to share holders. This is but one end of it, but it will affect in a positive fashion their share price, thus pleasing the share holders.
Any CPA's reading this, I realize this is the short, SHORT version (spaceballs reference)