Rumors heat up for EchoStar buy

Last week's stock price drop for EchoStar, after Q3 subscriber growth came in short of expectations, may have a silver lining for investors. The latest edition of Barron's reports that the price drop has "reinvigorated" AT&T's interest in trying to buy EchoStar. The story said talks had previously bogged down over EchoStar wanting 10 bucks per share more than the 65 that AT&T was willing to pay. There had been rumors for months that AT&T was stalking Charlie Ergen's satellite TV company as a way to quickly become a competitor to the cable MSOs. AT&T's U-Verse broadband TV system, based on fiber to the node technology, has met with mixed reviews. In any case, it will require many years of build-out to produce anything close to the national footprint that EchoStar's Dish Network already has.