"Telecom titan AT&T Corp launched China's first foreign telecom venture on Friday and gained a window into broadband Internet services in the country, a nascent market that will take time to gather steam."

When the going gets tough, get going! It seems that, in the absence of growth (and presence of actual decline) in domestic telecoms demand, AT&T will move to build a network in China. This seems foolish, given all of the debt, operational, and other problems that BellSouth's Latin American ventures have brought them.

Perhaps they're just looking to get lots of cash from the Chinese government, in order to pay off bondholders in the US, until they can divest themselves of the US wireline voice infrastructure and figure out how to turn a profit in wireless and data. ... Um, that could take a while.

AT&T Launches China Telecom Venture

[FT] spent tens of billions of dollars in the last two years on acquisitions and on wireless licenses ... quadrupling the company's debt in the process. Since those deals, however, the share prices of telecommunications companies have slid sharply. ... [An anaylst said,] "I'm not bullish on the stock. We still need more details."

France Télécom Reports $7.3 Billion Loss

In Europe, only Deutsche Telekom has more debt, with €62.1 billion weighing on its balance sheet. BT, the first big incumbent carrier in Europe to tackle its debt burden, is in the comparatively healthy position of owing just £14.5 billion.

France Telecom seeks £5bn more from asset sales

The former stock market star, which has axed thousands of jobs and seen its share price collapse to 8.9p over the last year, said market conditions had continued to deteriorate. ... Chavan Bhogaita, of Bear Stearns, said: "The failure to secure the (bank) facility at this stage has made the situation more urgent and the company must do something very, very soon to prevent a complete collapse in its share price." ... "We will be seeking a meeting ... in order to formulate a rescue package should it be required in order to avoid the collapse of the company."

Marconi shares slump 50%

I think the premise of this question is wrong.

Some commentary from columnist / telecom analyst Jeff Kagan, published in December 2001, before the Global Crossing bankruptcy came to light. His analysis here is missing a number of critical facts, including the RBOCs' tens of billions of dollars in outstanding bonds that will come due in the next year or so. With the market as it is, and scrutiny high in the post-Enron/post-Andersen era, it could become very difficult for them to pay off their maturing debts and sell new bonds. What then?

Is There Life After AT&T Broadband?

From the beginning it was a seductive relationship, with mutual needs and desires overwhelming the warnings to proceed cautiously. Now one of the parties, Global Crossing, is said to owe about $95 million to the other, J. P. Morgan Chase, which has little chance of recovering more than pennies on the dollar. ... "[Global Crossing's founder] kept talking about future cash flows. His projections were based on selling off capacity on the fiber optic networks. I felt those were really one-time asset sales, rather than predictable cash flow from operations, and I didn't like the level of risk. I projected that there would be too much capacity because other people were then talking about building fiber optic undersea cables. Any increase in capacity would push prices down. ... Everyone basically got greedy that the good times would go on forever. People did a lot of things that in hindsight did not make sense. The truth is, they did not make sense when they were doing them."

Chase's Early Dalliances With Global Crossing

... While part of the reason that WorldCom and MCI stocks are down is that the telecommunications industry is in the tank, at least as much of the blame belongs to Ebbers. ...

The article goes on to explain why Ebbers' idea to set up tracking stocks for various parts of the company was a terrible idea. Note that this is exactly what Michael Armstrong did at AT&T, which ultimately forced them to sell the BroadBand division.

Tracking the Trouble Caused by WorldCom's Bernie Ebbers

"Overcapacity, a glut of competitors and a lack of capital spending by companies on new networking and telecommunications equipment are making it difficult for even the strongest companies to avoid the turmoil," firm CEO John A. Challenger said in a news release.

Telecom Job Cuts Up, Worst Yet To Come

Rivals Global Crossing Ltd. and McLeodUSA recently filed for bankruptcy, while Metromedia Fiber Network Inc. on Monday warned that it may file for bankruptcy if it is unable to restructure its debts.

Qwest Gets New Breathing Room on Credit Pact

"The amazing thing is there's just no cash in the company. They basically went from 'Everything's seems to be OK,' to 'We're dead,' and that was during a recovery in the market," Kaufman Bros. analyst Vik Grover said. "For common shareholders, I think it's over. This is a death blow."

Metromedia Fiber Warns of Possible Bankruptcy