3 ms·
ATT has more debt than the Phillipines, it's no surprise that they're trying to cut costs.
by soniman 6y ago
ATT has more debt than the Phillipines, it's no surprise that they're trying to cut costs.
- MichaelZuo 6y agoBut what are their financing rates? They conceivably could have better long term security due to their position. And thus be fine with a higher debt loading. Utilities, at least those with a monopoly license, are quite close to State-owned-enterprise (SOEs).
- soniman 6y agoYou think they're going to pay off $168,000,000,000 of debt at the current rates? Maybe. If not, watch out.
- MichaelZuo 6y agoWell if they have a monopoly in certain areas/sectors and the only alternative to raising prices is bankruptcy... I’m pretty sure they can raise prices arbitrarily. That actually raises an interesting question, how are monopoly licenses valued? If their value can be bumped up every year on the balance sheet...
- DangitBobby 6y agoWhy do they have so much debt? Aren't they profitable?
- hakfoo 6y agoI'd expect they've got a LOT of baggage. They have the ex-SBC copper-wire networks they probably wish they could shed (compare when Verizon basically refused to rebuild damaged infrastructure after Hurricane Sandy). But they also went all-in on pay TV, buying DirecTV at a premium price just as cord-cutting became a thing. I wonder if we'll eventually see an "Amtrak" style nationalization for our POTS and related infrastructure. The firms with nothing sexier in their portfolio (Frontier) are frequently unhealthy, and the ones that do have other things to sell (Verizon, AT&) don't give it their full attention. It's no longer a competitive commercial product, but it serves enough of a public interest (i. e. not breaking a billion POTS-attached alarms, the high resiliency in natural disasters) that it can't just be dug up and scrapped for copper.