Reston, Va. ? Sprint Nextel Corp. reported Monday that its cell phone business suffered a net loss of 300,000 monthly subscribers in the fourth quarter and that the struggling wireless company will cut 5,000 jobs.

The company’s stock plunged more than 8 percent after the financial update, which included a 2007 outlook shy of many Wall Street forecasts.

Sprint said it expects its 2006 results to be in line with its previous guidance, with full-year revenue of $41 billion to $41.5 billion and adjusted operating income before depreciation and amortization of $12.6 billion to $12.9 billion. On average, analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial are forecasting 2006 earnings of $1.26 per share on sales of $41.53 billion.

For 2007, the company now expects operating revenue of $41 billion to $42 billion in 2007.

During the fourth quarter, Sprint added 742,000 net subscribers, ending the year with a customer base of 53.1 million. Those numbers include wholesale subscribers to other brands of cell phone service carried over the Sprint network such as Virgin Mobile.

The fourth quarter net additions included 876,000 from wholesalers and affiliate companies that sell Sprint Nextel services, as well as 171,000 new customers for Boost, a wholly owned subsidiary geared toward younger consumers.

Offsetting the gains, however, was a net decline of 306,000 direct subscribers driven by a continuing exodus of Nextel subscribers amid frustration about worsening service quality. The Sprint brand subscriber base grew during the quarter, but not enough to offset the Nextel drop.

The first quarter will see a continuation of the net decline in Sprint and Nextel customers, but the trend will turn positive for the second quarter and the full year, management said in a conference call, asserting that investments in adding caller capacity to the Nextel network began paying off in late 2006.

“We started to see positive indications in the fourth quarter,” Chairman and Chief Executive Gary Forsee said in an interview.

The planned job cuts, most of them expected in the first quarter, will reduce the size of Sprint’s work force to just below 60,000 positions.

Sprint has about 14,500 employees in the Kansas City area, with its operational headquarters in Overland Park.