How Much Pain Can Dish’s Clearwire Bid Inflict On Sprint?

-71.92%
Downside
22.68
Market
6.37
Trefis
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Clearwire (NASDAQ: CLWR) announced that it received an unsolicited bid from DISH Network (NASDAQ:DISH) that outbids Sprint’s (NYSE: S) offer by $500 million, coupled with an offer to buy 24% of Clearwire’s spectrum for $2.2 billion. DISH has also proposed a commercial agreement and capital assistance for Clearwire’s network build-out. DISH is offering $3.30 per share, compared to $2.97 offered by Sprint for Clearwire. This new development could upset the newly invigorated Sprint that has been significantly counting on acquiring Clearwire to strengthen its bandwidth. We will examine the different scenarios that could play out and their potential impact on Sprint.

See our complete analysis for Sprint

Scenario 1: Sprint Matches DISH’s Offer Leading To Bidding War

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Sprint would be forced to revise its offer for Clearwire to match DISH. Despite Sprint owning 50% of Clearwire, the latter’s management and board have a fiduciary duty towards its investors, and cannot approve the sale at a lower price. We feel DISH has the balance sheet to mount a lengthy and painful bidding war for Clearwire. This will force Sprint to potentially overpay as it desperately needs the additional spectrum to successfully compete with Verizon (NYSE:VZ) and AT&T (NYSE:T). Any additional diversion of capital to this acquisition will slow down Sprint’s aggressive growth plans and hurt its gross profit margins, which are dependent on improving operational inefficiencies.

Scenario 2: Board Rejects DISH And Approves Sale to Sprint

This would drag Sprint and Clearwire into a prolonged class action lawsuit by investors. The top five institutional holders hold nearly 28% of outstanding shares, and would be forced to rethink their approval of the Sprint deal in light of recent developments. A lawsuit could be a headwind for Sprint that is desperately fighting to stay relevant in the wireless market. An Federal Trade Commission (FTC) intervention cannot be ruled out as Sprint would effectively be barring a potential entrant to the highly concentrated wireless market. FTC could very well order an open auction of Clearwire’s spectrum since Sprint’s 50% stake in Clearwire could be construed as anti-competitive business practice.

Scenario 3: DISH acquires Clearwire

This would leave DISH in control of significant spectrum, thanks to its recent Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval to use its existing spectrum for wireless service. Although rolling out a nationwide wireless service is capital intensive, this scenario will provide DISH with an upper hand when negotiating a potential partnership with Sprint or other carriers. We believe Sprint will be the most likely contender for a partnership with DISH. The terms of such a deal may be heavily favorable to DISH as it holds the upper hand. It would be hard to predict how Softbank would respond in this scenario since there was intense speculation in the media that the Sprint acquisition is an indirect play for Clearwire’s spectrum. In October 2012, Softbank announced a $20 billion deal to acquire 70% of Sprint, which wasn’t received well by Softbank investors. The loss of Clearwire would definitely hamper Softbank’s risky bet on Sprint and question the rationale behind such an expensive acquisition.

This year, Sprint plans to spend $4 billion on capital expenditure. These capital expenditures are much more than what Sprint has historically spent. Moreover, Sprint is highly sensitive to CapEx increases, as can be seen by moving the trend line in the forecast chart below and following the corresponding impact on its price estimate. Additional spectrum capacity will go a long way in bringing these costs down in the long run. Hence the loss of Clearwire will adversely impact one of the key goals of Sprint’s Network Vision plan to improve margins, as it would have to increase its capital expenditure to make up for the loss of Clearwire.

Irrespective of how this new development plays out, Sprint investors are bound to be jittery again after a couple of months of renewed confidence in the company, post the Softbank deal.