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To: NOW who wrote (37763)	5/2/2002 6:10:02 PM
From: reaper	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 209892

Dood, that is a question of fundamentals on an E-wave board. Can't we get banned for that <g> Its tough to know. There are apparantly ratings "triggers" on some of their debt, like at Enron (i.e. if they get downgraded to "junk" then the debt is in default and they have to pay it back), but they are attempting to re-negotiate them now. The bonds are trading right now as if the equity is pretty much worthless. So basically it is in the bond-holders hands. If they want to take their chances in bankruptcy court, they could probably force WCOM in soon. If they instead want to extend a life-line, they can re-negotiate the triggers and give time for WCOM to sell off some assets and maybe they can come out of this whole. The problem with the "asset selling" scenario is, who the heck is gonna buy telecom assets today? I don't think WCOM has any DROOPY shares among its assets <g>, so what are they going to sell?? Over a longer-term time frame, I think the equity at both WCOM and T is worth $0. They are both "wasting assets" in my opinion. And for a real-life example of how f'd up WCOM is....I have been an MCI customer for probably 15 years. To my knowledge I have paid every bill on time, and I spend a decent amount on long distance every month. About 4 months ago I paid my MCI bill through my electronic bill-paying account at Fleet, and something got screwed up and MCI thinks they didn't get the check. It was for $32.50. I have received no less than 20 phone calls requesting their $32.50. I have mailed them copies of the CANCELLED CHECK (I did in fact pay) but they still keep calling. Just yesterday they called threatening to cancel my long distance service. Can you believe, a loyal customer for 15 years who spends $500 a year on long distance and they are going to get rid of me over $32.50. UFB morons those people are. Anyway..... Cheers

To: NOW who wrote (37763)	5/2/2002 6:24:05 PM
From: ajtj99	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 209892

davidd, WCOM is a certain chapter 11. I've been thinking that for over 6-months, but I didn't think it would happen this quickly. They are in default with a bunch of their covenants due to their low stock price. The downgrades will rain down on them, forcing the stock price lower in a never ending downspiral. Verizon gets their Long Distance in a chpater 11, IMO. The only question remaining is who winds up with Digex and UUnet. Verizon has no need for Digex, as they already have tons invested in that area. UUnet will be the one asset that will bring some good money. The rest will be bought at fire-sale prices. I looked at WCOM's finances closely because our CLEC was running out of cash by March. I switched to WCOM based upon the assumption that Verizon would end up with the majority of their local and LD business. That still leaves me with a competitive player in my market if it turns out that way. Qwest will also go chapter 11, but they'll re-organize most likely due to the US West connection. LVLT will most likely disappear as an entity. ATT is most likely going to end up as part of SBC too. We'll be left with Bell South, Verizon, SBC, and Quest. Kind of an Oligopoly in the phone biz.