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Bloomberg Report Suggests Comcast & Time Warner Merger Dead
andyring writes: According to Bloomberg News, the Time Warner/Comcast merger of raw evil is dead. Comcast plans as early as tomorrow to withdraw the merger proposal, "after regulators decided that the deal wouldn't help consumers, making approval unlikely" according to the story. If so, that means regulators won't have the chance to kill it themselves.
Well, we shall see if the FCC commissioners who leave office after the next administration takes office heads towards one of these players or not. I'm not so sure the next administration will be for this merger or not. Obviously the democratic ruled commission doesn't like this idea, but which party will be in the Whitehouse and what their position on this merger would be is an open question.
Suffice it to say, this deal is dead for at least two and likely more years.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
That's a pretty silly logical fallacy. Just because they have undue influence doesn't mean they always win, or can win against the entirety of public opinion. It's far more important all of the things they can accomplish that the public doesn't know, understand, or have the capacity to mount a successful counter-campaign.
They just need to regroup, figure out who to buy off, and do it again.
So you don't think that Comcast knows who is responsible for approving the merger?
It's not like it's hard to figure out who the FCC commissioners are. There are 5 total, 3 democrats and 2 republicans. Currently the chair is held by Thomas Wheeler, appointed by Obama who's term runs until 2018 who is a past industry lobbyist for the cable industry.
Unless there is some serious palm greasing between now and then, I doubt that the commissioners will be changing their stance on this and given their very public refusal to approve the merger I doubt that Comcast has enough money to grease enough hands to change enough commission votes as we barrel into a presidential election cycle. It would be too much of a scandal to be worth the political risk.
No, this deal will have to wait for the commissioners to start turning over after the current administration leaves office, which will mean a whole new set of palms to grease and/or politicians to support in the next election cycle so you can get commissioners appointed who are more favorable to your deal.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101