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Official Tmobile-Sprint merger discussion thread


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My opinion is Dish is interested only if the Government slices up Sprint's and some of T Mobile's  spectrum and basically hands it over on a silver tray at substantially lower than market value I'm sure...  I don't think Dish want's to cough up any more money than they have to...actually I don't get the feeling they are even really interested.  Dish is just stirring the pot.      And the longer the morons at the DOJ take the more they give the haters time to compose and assemble.   This should have been decided last week or 2 weeks ago when the FCC came out with their approval opinion.   They usually announce in unison...   Again... nothing is progressing normally.    What happened to Amazon?  I've heard nothing more about them wanting to buy Boost.   

 

Imo this would work in TMO/Sprint’s favor. If the concession is to create a 4th carrier .. a company to get started will require more spectrum than just 2.5 .. they will need low band/ mid band to get started which would require them to give up more spectrum.. dish already has that spectrum. So, if they have to give up 40mhz of 2.5 MHz to get the merger through I would call that a win

 

Dish said they are ready to spend 10 billion to start off

 

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12 hours ago, bigsnake49 said:

Yes, they are heavily lobbied by AT&T and Verizon and that's why I don't want them to spinoff Boost or divest spectrum. We need a strong merged company to compete with AT&T and Verizon.

I don't know where y'all got this idea that At&t and Verizon are lobbying against the merger.

They're not. This merger is good for them.

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I don't know where y'all got this idea that At&t and Verizon are lobbying against the merger.
They're not. This merger is good for them.

If John and team keep the un-carrier alive and really lower prices .. this merger won’t be so good for them


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2 minutes ago, tyroned3222 said:


If John and team keep the un-carrier alive and really lower prices .. this merger won’t be so good for them


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Better to have one carrier with lower prices than two. They're not against the merger at all.

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https://finance.yahoo.com/news/t-mobile-sprint-vow-fight-232342816.html

This brings it back full circle. Time to get a bigger tub of popcorn.

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7 hours ago, dkyeager said:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/t-mobile-sprint-vow-fight-232342816.html

This brings it back full circle. Time to get a bigger tub of popcorn.

Time for a bathroom break.... We've ate too many Large orders of Popcorn and big gulp sodas...    Sorry...couldn't resist the opportunity to bring "potty talk" into it.   LOL   

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Time for a bathroom break.... We've ate too many Large orders of Popcorn and big gulp sodas...    Sorry...couldn't resist the opportunity to bring "potty talk" into it.   LOL   

Ready for more popcorn !!! Lol looks like states got a TRO approved and the merger will be at minimum delayed another 6 months.. sounds like it will be treated as a high profile case.

 

https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/t-mobile-sprint-merger-appears-to-be-in-major-trouble/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

 

 

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1 hour ago, tyroned3222 said:

Ready for more popcorn !!! Lol looks like states got a TRO approved and the merger will be at minimum delayed another 6 months.. sounds like it will be treated as a high profile case.

 

https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/t-mobile-sprint-merger-appears-to-be-in-major-trouble/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

 

 

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According to the article, it’s likely that the TRO will be approved.... but from what I can tell, it hasn’t been yet.

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According to the article, it’s likely that the TRO will be approved.... but from what I can tell, it hasn’t been yet.

Not yet, but the hill is also reporting similar .. the states are very confident they can this approved ASAP.
“Legal experts who spoke to The Hill said the states have a strong antitrust case, predicting the ensuing legal battle could drag on for months, if not years.”


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1 hour ago, tyroned3222 said:

Ready for more popcorn !!! Lol looks like states got a TRO approved and the merger will be at minimum delayed another 6 months.. sounds like it will be treated as a high profile case.

 

https://nypost.com/2019/06/12/t-mobile-sprint-merger-appears-to-be-in-major-trouble/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

 

 

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The states have not gotten a TRO yet but according to the post they have a better chance of getting one. However if the DOJ approves the merger, then it would be embarrassing for the states to have sued when the DOJ approved it with provisions that already addressed their concerns, mainly lower prices.

My legal strategy if I was Sprint is get the FCC's approval and then fight both the DOJ and attys general in court. There is absolutely no anti-trust concerns with this merger, not when the resulting company has only 25% of the wireless market revenue and whose customers are mainly prepaid bargain hunters.

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11 minutes ago, tyroned3222 said:


Not yet, but the hill is also reporting similar .. the states are very confident they can this approved ASAP.
“Legal experts who spoke to The Hill said the states have a strong antitrust case, predicting the ensuing legal battle could drag on for months, if not years.”


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The states have absolutely no anti-trust case. They might have a merger might eliminate a desperate, price bottom feeder (Sprint) case, if at that. This is a desperate attempt by the states to wring additional concessions. My 7 bullet points above should address most of the states' concern. 

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The states have not gotten a TRO yet but according to the post they have a better chance of getting one. However if the DOJ approves the merger, then it would be embarrassing for the states to have sued when the DOJ approved it with provisions that already addressed their concerns, mainly lower prices.
My legal strategy if I was Sprint is get the FCC's approval and then fight both the DOJ and attys general in court. There is absolutely no anti-trust concerns with this merger, not when the resulting company has only 25% of the wireless market revenue and whose customers are mainly prepaid bargain hunters.

Yup, insiders are saying they are very very confident they can get this approved . The TRO seems to over power the FCC and DOJ so to

“The DOJ has no power to head off the TRO, an attorney close to the merging parties said.

TMO/Sprint may have to battle this one in court


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The states have absolutely no anti-trust case. They might have a merger might eliminate a desperate, price bottom feeder (Sprint) case, if at that. This is a desperate attempt by the states to wring additional concessions. My 7 bullet points above should address most of the states' concern. 

Yup and it doesn’t, but this is very politically motivated and biased.
“There are some republican judges in the southern district but not many. The 2nd court of appeals has 11 republican judges out of 25 members. The merger is in tough shape based on this. If you are correct, the Supreme Court could save the merger? But, 4 justices have to agree to take the case. And if there isn’t a compelling constitutional reason for the court to take the case it may just allow lower court rulings to stand. What I mean is, if TMO were making a serious challenge to the anti-trust laws based on constitutional grounds, that would be a possible reason to hear the case. But, if TMO accepts the legitimacy of anti-trust laws and they are just fighting it out on the merits of the merger inside the current anti-trust system and they lose at the lower courts then I feel it would be likely the Supreme Court would accept the 2nd court of appeals decision.”


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I would countersue the states in a more conservative jurisdiction and a accuse them of gross overreach of authority on constitutional grounds. Remember that the states have no standing to sue on anti-trust grounds. The lower price argument also sounds shallow when you pledge no price increases on current plans for 3 years. The other major demand about rural coverage, again is gross overreach on the federal level. They can probably sue in state courts on those grounds but not in federal courts, no jurisdiction. I included it in my 7 bullet point concessions because it would be a throwaway for T-Mobile. They are expanding their rural coverage anyway so it would be an easy concession to make.

 

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By the way, The Hill is a publication mostly made up of Dem's.   Just saying.    All the suing parties are Dems.     Not trying to make this sound political but it is.   this is totally on party lines.   

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I also would not be shocked if the States were thrown out of Federal court for now.  They technically do not have a case until the Feds APPROVE the merger.  They have not been harmed until that point.  Suing because the Feds might approve a merger may not be sufficient.  Actually harm most likely is required, not potential.

Robert

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2 hours ago, S4GRU said:

I also would not be shocked if the States were thrown out of Federal court for now.  They technically do not have a case until the Feds APPROVE the merger.  They have not been harmed until that point.  Suing because the Feds might approve a merger may not be sufficient.  Actually harm most likely is required, not potential.

Robert

Hope you're right Robert.    I'm hoping this gets all ironed out.  

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The idea that there is "no anti-trust concern" seems entirely at odds with what I have read about the HHI calculation for the merger.  (HHI: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/h/hhi.asp )  The HHI value of the merged company would increase its value by 400-500 in the wireless market from what I understand, which puts it squarely within the range of anti-trust concerns, which arise when the HHI value increases by 200 or more.

I'm even less clear on what the point of highlighting perceived media biases has to do with anything.

- Trip

 

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HHI is a very flawed measurement. One of those examples from your link illustrates it:

For example, assume an industry has 20 firms. Firm one has a market share of 48.59% and each of the 19 remaining firms has a market share of 2.71% each. The HHI would exactly 2,500, indicating a highly concentrated market. If firm number one had a market share of 35.82% and each of the remaining firms had a 3.38% market share, the HHI would be exactly 1,500, indicating a competitive marketplace.

In both of those cases, you have a very high market share firm dominating the market place. If you applied the example to the wireless marketplace which has tremendous capital expenses every year and more so during generational deployments (3G-4G-5G), the high maketshare firm would quickly swamp the smaller firms since they don't have the scale to compete. Now if it was a low capital investment kind of market place then the smaller firms have a much better chance to survive and compete. 

If this merger is denied I think that Sprint will survive but never thrive or compete with the other 3 on anything but price which means that it cannot invest in its network to the degree that the other 3 can. It will fall behind. The big problem with wireless in this country is not rural deployments, it is suburban and exurban deployments. I do believe that you need about 60-65,000 macro sites to cover the urban/suburban/exurban areas even if you do roam on others for rural coverage. Sprint does not have the low and mid band spectrum that the other 3 have. Can they make up for it? Yes if they can host Dish's spectrum and Comcast's 600Mhz spectrum plus pick off some of the speculators 600Mhz spectrum. But Dish does not want to invest in a network or be a carrier particularly in a 4 carrier marketplace, they want to speculate on their spectrum. The big cable cos want to deploy CBRS and C-Band spectrum using stand mount and pole mount small cells. Can they be convince to host Sprint's 2.5 GHz small cells also ala Altice and Cox? Sure, there are some efforts here and there.

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6 hours ago, S4GRU said:

I also would not be shocked if the States were thrown out of Federal court for now.  They technically do not have a case until the Feds APPROVE the merger.  They have not been harmed until that point.  Suing because the Feds might approve a merger may not be sufficient.  Actually harm most likely is required, not potential.

Robert

DOJ might stall for this very reason.

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6 hours ago, S4GRU said:

I also would not be shocked if the States were thrown out of Federal court for now.  They technically do not have a case until the Feds APPROVE the merger.  They have not been harmed until that point.  Suing because the Feds might approve a merger may not be sufficient.  Actually harm most likely is required, not potential.

Robert

It is questionable whether the states have any case at all. Interstate communication is the sole purview of the FCC and interstate commerce is overseen by the DOJ and the Federal Trade Commission. States - even acting in concert - basically have no standing on either the communication or the antitrust aspects of the merger. At some point, the Federal courts will make this finding. It remains to be seen whether they delay so long that the merger fails. 

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