Wall St. Journal: "AT&T's Critics on T-Mobile Deal Growing"
The Wall St. Journal is out with a story tonight which points to growing opposition to AT&T's plan to takeover T-Mobile. The story will be in tomorrow's paper.
It highlights the following:
- New opposition from Leap Wireless, the company behind Cricket;
- Concerns from Metro PCS;
- The decision by the California Public Utilities Commission to investigate the proposed transaction, as well as a decision 2 weeks ago by the Louisiana Public Service Commission to do the same;
- Recent decisions by the Justice Department to block other "horizontal" mergers;
- The FCC's Friday letters to AT&T and Deutsche Telekom asking the companies 97 additional questions about the proposed transaction; and
- Last week's Congressional hearing where Republicans joined with Democrats in asking questions about the proposed transaction.
The story quotes two industry analysts expressing doubt about AT&T's plans getting approved.
"AT&T opened with such a tightly controlled and well orchestrated launch, they controlled the story line for awhile," said Rebecca Arbogast, an analyst with Stifel Nicholas. "Now we are seeing some say, 'Wait a minute, is this really the market structure we want in the U.S.?' "
Arbogast's remarked were followed by some from Craig Moffett, an analyst with Sanford C. Bernstein. "The air of inevitability has drained away," Moffett said.
Perhaps that's why AT&T's CEO Randall Stephenson looks so angry in this photo I snapped of him at last week's House Judiciary Subcommittee hearing on the proposed T-Mobile takeover.
Things are just not going well for AT&T.
p.s. I have more pictures and details from the hearing in my previous post. Be sure to click on each photo and read the captions. (That's the best part!)
