Judge OKs merger of Sprint, T-Mobile; big farm lender's report says rural wireless operators could be hurt

Today a federal judge ruled in favor of a proposed $26 billion merger of Sprint and T-Mobile that would also introduce Dish Network as a wireless provider. However, the deal can't proceed until the California Public Utilities Commission approves it, Lauren Feiner reports for CNBC.

"Attorneys general from New York, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia and D.C. originally brought the lawsuit to block the deal following approval from the Justice Department [and the] Federal Communications Commission," Feiner reports. "The states had argued that combining the No. 3 and No. 4 U.S. carriers would limit competition and result in higher prices for consumers. The companies had argued their merger would help them compete against top players AT&T and Verizon and advance efforts to build a nationwide 5G network."

Rural and farm lender CoBank recently provided an in-depth picture of how the merger could affect rural America and made some projections. Economist Jeff Johnston wrote that it's difficult to predict how the deal will play out, but T-Mobile's lack of roaming agreements with rural operators concerns him. "According to the Rural Wireless Association, Sprint has been an important roaming partner for many rural operators as they fill Sprint’s coverage gaps," Johnston reports. The roaming deals are sometimes a significant source of revenue for rural wireless providers, but T-Mobile has not pursued such rural coverage deals as aggressively as Sprint. 

If T-Mobile's current management leads the new T-Mobile, they might abandon Sprint's roaming strategy, and rural wireless operators could take a "significant revenue hit," Johnston writes. If T-Mobile takes seriously its promises to improve rural coverage, rural residents could benefit, he writes.