U.S. government sues to block AT&T, T-Mobile merger [updated]

Not all companies are put up for sale because they’re losing money.

Ok… well, we can make that argument when it actually applies to the companies we are talking about.  DT put T-Mobile USA up for sale for a reason.  And that reason was losing money, losing a *record* number of subscribers each quarter and proceding to break its own record the next quarter.  And to make their losses even harder to swallow, their operating revenues are plummeting.

@7c0cc0fac3083d0d187aad15ce368ae3:disqus That’s what I was getting at.

And the facts don’t back you up: they gained 137k, then lost 23k, then 99k, then 50k customers the past 3 quarters.

They banked over 200 million last quarter, so no they’re not losing money.

You really need to learn how to read earnings if you want to discuss this… They had 200 million dollars of ***revenue***… revenue and profit aren’t the same thing.  Revenue does not take into account expenses and cash outflow… ya know, like salaries, maintenance of its network, expansion of its network… and their electric bills, water bills, lease payments… so  with 42,000 employees, 200 million dollars is nothing.  That’s less than 5000 dollars per employee for the quarter… so the question must be asked… do you assume that T-Mobile pays each one of its employees barely more than 19,000 dollars per year and offers no health insurance or 401k benefits?  And obviously, they lease their office buildings for free… right?

And at myself… I’m sure I’m even a mile off on revenues without looking them up.  But T-Mobile USA isn’t in a healthy position currently.  Whatever the numbers are — losing their contracts is not good for their future, revenues declining are bad, and losing handset money…. all negative signs.  This isn’t Sprint shedding old customers on retired plans that boosts its overall financials  These are healthy contracts they are losing.

From their latest quarterly earnings:

Service revenues in the  second quarter of 2011  of $4.6 billion

$4 Billion in REVENUE from contracts.

$5 Billion in total REVENUE

NET INCOME = $212 million

There’s a difference between DECLINING revenues, and profits VS LOSING MONEY.

I didn’t read the tmo’s quarterly earnings word for word, but did you even take a look at it?

Think about it – $200 million in revenue from 34 million customers would mean an average bill of about $2 Dollars per month.

“They banked over 200 million last quarter, so no they’re not losing money.”

Your numbers, not mine. Precisely why I said they were probably wrong numbers in a separate post afterwards. No, I didn’t look them up. I’m typing on my Thunderbolt. Not exactly conducive to research. The specifics, however, are irrelevant. They have an unsustainable business. Their continued losses make it so. They can’t compete with prices on prepaid services, and they can’t hold on to postpaid. They aren’t long for this world, so to speak.