General Motors Company Message Board

I mention this because to the extent that the fed shares that view, it is likely to go slow with withdrawl of QE.

Today's empire mfg. report and homebuilders survey pushed MREIT prices lower, but to the extent that the fed views continued 2% growth as likely, that provides a suitable backdrop for a very gradual phaseout of QE, which would benefit most MREITS, especially annaly.

S

Where did you read it, grftt?

S

Sprint isn't going to tender to dish.

Also, remember that Crest is only one shareholder. Dish is more likely to appeal to the "gang of 4"... Kellett and company, who, unlike Crest, aren't hell-bent to see clearwire remain independent. Those guys just want a fair price.

S

Substantial jump, even for a minor holiday period.

Appears to indicate that patrons are looking more aggressively for reasons to visit, even during short/minor holiday periods. I would suspect that it was skewed toward mass business, so it may contribute to a tick up in SCL share.

S

The slowdown in overlaying the cell sites was borne more out of how quickly sprint would need augmentation than out of any other delay factor. It was clear back when the target bonus was amended that the slowdown was based on matching clearwire/sprint capability with their respective timelines.

S

I was thinking about an advantage to a dish equity stake in terms of dish "helping to fix up the larger pipes" just this morning. You beat me to the comment.

It follows that a dish equity stake might naturally lead to a dish wholesale usage of Clearwire's network as an early, quick application of what they seek to achieve. It's fair to say the Mr. Son would be much more amenable to such an agreement than he would with governance issues and dish tonnage on the network would also add to their clout as a growing operational dependency.

Even today, dish is packaging it's "hopper" service with WiFi transmitting and, I believe, even a free pad computer to take your favorite videos all over the house and yard with you. The step from WiFi-enabled hopper systems to one capable to receiving movies via LTE is not a big one. They could be enabling "hopper" systems to download video content via TD-LTE in a fairly short timeframe of establishing such an agreement.

S.

As quickly as they're needed in far east geographies where development on that frequency is far, far ahead of where it is so far in the U.S. I believe that there will be numerous handsets capable of handing off signals on Sprint LTE devices by next winter.

S

A couple of points.

First off, they're "metro areas", where clearwire's strengths are. Sprint and Clearwire identified the Clearwire cell sites that would be "most needed", and those would be the first 2,000 sites.

Secondly, Sprint still has not yet repurposed the nextel spectrum, which means that they're still running 5x5 FD-LTE where it's deployed, which is minimal and slow. The need to get clearwire's augmentation capacity is high.

Personally, I think the need for augmentation from clearwire is really expected to accelerate during the last half of this year and the first half of 2014, and I think Masayoshi Son would like to get his acquisition of Clearwire done and finished before people are aware of what kind of volumes are going to occur.

Also, since WiMax won't be gone next december, I'm sure he would also like to have this sewed up ahead of negotiation surrounding that as well. He isn't going to want things looking TOO good ahead of the vote that eventually works.

S.

China differs greatly from the U.S. in that most credit is adopted for "productive" purposes... like expanding business or building things. The most "controversial" aspect of that is the degree to which credit has been used to construct housing that is under-utilized.

As you say, China's government has much less debt and Chinese citizens are subtantially under-leveraged. The U.S. is the opposite... large amounts of government and "consumer" debt.

The reason is obvious... The U.S. has become "hyper-keynsian" over the years. Virtually every decent tax break relates to "overconsumption" and almost every "punative" tax relates to production, business, and employers... very much the opposite in most ways from China.

Spok

Not sure if your post is comprised of loaded questions or what...

Sure, some of the buybacks are to replace "incentive" shares... for a multitude of strategy-essential employees, I'm sure... but there is also a primary intent to reduce the float overall.

Chum is about as objective as they come. In 6 years of reading his reports, I've not seen one indication of bias toward one company or another... your insinuation to the contrary is strange and un-informed.

Most current sands china execs have extensive experience. David Fisk was a top executive at Wynn prior to landing him (controller there) and has been instrumental with SCL's adoption of Wynn's best practices in terms of their gradually improving table efficiency.

Chum is visionary, IMO. He's noted for seeing trends before they occur. I see him as a significant augmentation to Adelson's own talents in that regard.

S

Why would there be a concern about whether or not shares could be purchased? As long as there's a float, the shares will be there... the only concern being what "price" you would pay to acquire the shares.

Even when float is very thin, as long as they're trading, they're available.

DirecTV is a good example of a company that's been aggressively buying back stock for years. So much so that it's a priciple driver (denominator) of their earnings per share. Trade it anytime you want... nice tight bid/ask.

The Birinyi portion of your post was useful, however. Thx.

Spok

For those who don't know him, Grant is, IMO, the most talented analyst in the gaming sector who is based in the far east. Looking at his Mass VS VIP projections from a few years ago, one would see how accurately that today's reality is tracking vs his projections as amazingly remarkable. I've personally followed his reports and analysis for 6 years running and would rely on his opinion ahead of anyone elses in the intustry.

There's no question in my mind that he will be an asset to LVS's strategic thinking, globally sure, but in the far east, definately.

Spok

S

Interesting points, Blitz.

IMO, Son's "well-broadcasted" interest in T-Mobile is a head fake... something he learned from watching years of Dan Hesse drive down expectations for clearwire. The T-Mobile thing is just like Son's statement that "he could live with a 34% minority interest"... and then turns around and raises his bid.. :-o .. NOT.

However... if Son lost out on sprint but got 34% of clearwire, he could angle a deal for his clearwire shares in return for 50 or 60 mhz of 2.5 ghz spectrum, buy T-Mobile, and augment T-Mob's towers with his clearwire spectrum to emulate what he's doing in Japan...

... unlikely, but then, there are dozens of possible scenarios, so why not this one!

Spok

Purely a technicality, T.K.

The sprint bid didn't have the votes to begin with... and the changed recommendation of the CLWR board seals it even more completely.

You're right, the "tender" doesn't require a vote, but it is a defacto vote given that dish requires that at least 25% ouf outstanding shares take the deal.

S

Yes, Clearwire has been rising on the market ever since Dan Hesse used the words "next steps".

S

Yes, being in the "drivers seat" doesn't mean they've won the race, but by beating sprint's bid by a dollar, it appears to have gotten dish solidly off the starting line and tearing down the track.

Sprint wasn't even off the starting line with minority investors.

Sprint's making more of the governance issues than they deserve. They're just trying to do what they've been doing for the past 3 years... lower expectations so that Mr. Son's upcoming bid might create more of a sense of urgency among shareholders.

In bidding wars like this, words mean nothing... only propaganda. Actions mean everything.

Like Mr. Son's talk of a T-Mobile plan B... what a steaming pile of cow dung THAT is.

Frankly, I'm beginning to believe that teamrep isn't an investor of any kind... and certainly not being paid by anyone for any posts.

Is view of clearwire is that of an "antagonist", but he vehemently denied having any kind of a short position... or any position of any kind for that matter.

Well, I believe him on that score.

I think he just posts out here for the sport of it and enjoys rialing up long investors using an extensive technical vocabulary to build his credibility.

A couple of years ago, I would leverage off of his techno-talk to augment my own knowledge some, but now that the bidding and organizational issues are front and center... the contrarian "end-game", so to speak, there's little value in TRs posts, especially given their antagonist bent.

S.

Yes, he still has to get the votes, but with each higher bid, more votes should peel off.

I noticed that Dish quickly stated that they already HAD a few hundred thousand votes. That's nothing, but dish made the point to try to generate some momentum since you are right when you say it's still a big mountain to climb. S.