The collapse of the $39 billion dollar mega-merger has been a financial windfall for DISH Network investors.
Since the potential tie-up between the second and fourth-largest wireless carriers in the U.S. officially went down the tubes on Monday, industry rumors have been swirling around a potential hookup between AT&T and DISH Network. AT&T desperately wants more wireless spectrum, and DISH has it. (The possibility of a DISH-T-Mobile merger has also been raised in the past couple of weeks.)
While DISH's stock price has remained relatively flat today, it jumped nearly 11 percent at one point on Tuesday before settling in with a gain of $2.30 per share, or 9 percent. Stifel Nicolaus' Christopher King said in an investor note this week that the government would be more likely to approve a deal between a wireless carrier and a satellite company as opposed to a pair of wireless carriers.
The race to collect spectrum is huge as regulators and lawmakers try to free up more airwaves to meet the escalating demand for wireless services, driven by data and video consumption on smartphones, tablet computers and other mobile devices. Earlier this month, AT&T's top competitor, Verizon Wireless, inked a $3.6 billion agreement to purchase 122 spectrum licenses that cover 259 million points of presence from SpectrumCo LLC, a joint venture between Comcast Corp., Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks. The companies also have announced several commercial agreements that will enable the cable operators and Verizon Wireless to sell each other's products and services – meaning the cable companies will no longer be handicapped by lack of a wireless offering.
