Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Cantor Fitzgerald Seeks New Commodity to Trade: Mobile Airwaves

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 16 May 2003 00:43:14 -0400

Cantor Fitzgerald Seeks New Commodity to Trade: Mobile Airwaves
 
Washington
 May 15, 2003 

(Bloomberg) -- Cantor Fitzgerald LP, owner of the largest electronic broker in the $3
trillion U.S. Treasury market, has its eye on a new commodity: airwaves. 

Cantor is among the companies lobbying the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to allow
mobile-phone providers such as AT&T Wireless Services Inc. to lease airwaves licenses to
rivals. Cantor wants to match up the buyers and sellers of spectrum space. 

The commission will vote today on rule changes that would encourage such a market. 

"This is one that we're keeping a close eye on,'' said Brent Wilkins, who manages New
York-based Cantor's telecommunications- markets operations from Cary, North Carolina.
Cantor made a 44- page slide presentation to the FCC in December outlining its case for
increasing trading in spectrum. 

Cantor made its mark as a go-between for Wall Street dealers and banks seeking to trade
assets anonymously. The company has sought to boost revenue by expanding the products
handled by its eSpeed Inc. electronic-trading arm. Trading airwaves, while unlikely to
rival revenue generated from trading bonds or stocks, was advocated by Enron Corp. before
it declared bankruptcy. 

AT&T Wireless, Verizon Wireless Inc. and Cingular Wireless LLC also have lobbied the FCC
to allow spectrum leasing. 

Wilkins declined to discuss Cantor's predictions for how big the market could become.
Cantor Chief Executive Howard Lutnick wasn't available to comment. 

Rural Areas 

Existing rules discourage trading or leasing spectrum because companies must get FCC
approval, the companies said. Australia and New Zealand are the only countries that allow
spectrum to be traded or leased, FCC spokeswoman Meribeth McCarrick said. 

The biggest U.S. wireless carriers hold about 3,000 airwave licenses, said Michael
Altschul, attorney for the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association. Of those,
about 1,500 to 2,000 cover rural areas, 90 percent of which aren't served by wireless
carriers, said Caressa Bennet, a Washington attorney and lobbyist for rural cellular
companies. 

Leasing unused airwaves in rural areas and "dead spots'' to smaller carriers would help
larger mobile-phone companies increase sales, company executives said. 

At Cantor, Wilkins wants to revive sales at his telecommunications unit, which had tried
to broker deals for fiber- optic network capacity and other landline assets. 

That business never took off, Wilkins said, because companies such as Global Crossing Ltd.
installed too much fiber-optic cable, leading to oversupply as demand dropped. Airwaves
hold more potential as a trading commodity because licenses aren't being issued as
rapidly, he said. 

Cantor bought Wilkins's brokerage in July 2001, two months before terrorists crashed
airplanes into the World Trade Center, killing 658 Cantor employees. 

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aTOCSO01btYo&refer=us

------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~-->
Get A Free Psychic Reading!
Your Online Answer To Life's Important Questions.
http://us.click.yahoo.com/aM1XQD/od7FAA/uetFAA/61FxlB/TM
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/