T-Mobile Sprint merger cast into doubt once more

The US Department of Justice might not let the merger go through in its current form, according to reports.

The WSJ has the scoop, citing those handy people familiar with the matter once more, who also seem to have been chatting to Reuters. According to the latter, which isn’t paywalled, the DoJ has concerns about the deal as it’s currently structured. The news caused shares in both companies to fall and their respective CEOs to tweet coded dissent.

Both John Legere and Marcelo Claure said the article is, respectively, untrue and not accurate. While on the surface these might appear to be absolute rebuttals, it’s actually a bit more nuanced than that. Legere says the premise of the article is untrue without detailing what he thinks that premise is, while any small part of the piece could be inaccurate without the overall claim being so.

Here’s the opening paragraph of the WSJ story: “Justice Department antitrust enforcement staff have told T-Mobile US Inc. and Sprint Corp. that their planned merger is unlikely to be approved as currently structured, according to people familiar with the matter, casting doubt on the fate of the $26 billion deal.”

There’s not much else to say at this stage but the process certainly seems to be dragging on. Presumably there has been some discussions between the two companies and someone on the DoJ side decided to up the pressure on TMUS and Sprint to compromise via this mini-leak. Let’s see.