The great telecom battle begins

The Wall Street Journal reported this past weekend that AT&T (formerly SBC Communications) will acquire Bell South for $67 billion in stock. As someone who worked in the telecom industry, I can tell you that this is a big deal. It’s essentially the rebirth of Ma Bell. Once this merger closes, assuming it receives the proper approvals from the government authorities (either the FCC or the FTC), a large chunk of the country from North Carolina, down to Florida, west to Texas, and good chunk of the Midwest will once again receive its local phone bills from AT&T.

 

I am particularly interested in how Verizon will respond. Hopefully this will light up the telecom industry once again and the shares of some of the telecom companies will go up.