Opinions
John Zechner
Sprint Nextel
S-N
DON'T BUY
Aug 17, 2012
Stock price when the opinion was issued
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Chart looks good. Has had a great recovery so far this year. Some of the telcos have been a good haven when economically sensitive stocks were out of favour. Doesn’t know, valuation wise, that there is that much upside left from here. If you own, he would be inclined to take a little money off the table.
There is a bid in from Softbank and a better offer from Dish Networks and he thinks there will be a higher offer coming. If none of this was happening right now he would tend to be a Seller because in the environment of the US that is going all wireless, big companies are going to snuff out the competition.
Just announced a merger with T-Mobile (TMUS-Q). Telecom has been an industry under pressure for a long time, and we are starting to see smaller players consolidate to cut costs. These are investments you want to hold, only to milk the cash flows remaining in them. The saturation level of smart phones is pretty high. There is probably some volume growth, but the game is largely over and we are going to be facing competitive pricing. It’s a cost-squeeze game.
Has had a pretty substantial move so far this year. Clearly the fundamentals have improved. Pricing is more favourable and margins are starting to improve again. Has been a good story and has turned around but he would like to see if they can maintain that for a couple of quarters in a more competitive environment.