Qwest To Write Down $30 Billion

from the a-billion-here,-a-billion-there... dept

Apparently, Qwest saw last week's announcement that AOL was going to write down $54 billion and got jealous. So, they're going to write down somewhere in the range of $30 billion. That $30 billion is to take away worthless "goodwill" associated with their merger with US West. That was apparently a $36 billion merger. The quick math (I didn't even write this down) then obviously suggests that Qwest paid $30 billion too much out of $36 billion. Oops. Also, it turns out that entirely unrelated to that whole mess the SEC is getting ready to slap Qwest on the wrist about other randomly bad accounting practices.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 2 Apr 2002 @ 10:42am

    Then the FTC or FCC should get involved...

    ... and bitch slap them for their incredibly bad business practices. Have you ever tried to cancel a Qwest account? They block you at every turn. They will slam you in 10 seconds, but it takes two months to change away from them as a LD provider. We finally had to threaten them with a PUCO report to get them to admit that our contract with them had expired three months prior and let our service be moved. You ought to try to read one of their invoices: deliberately obfuscated, and overcharges are a regular occurence. I hope they tank.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Old Man Harris, 2 Apr 2002 @ 12:19pm

    No Subject Given

    Did you see the article about Qwest CEO Joseph Nacchio in the Wall Street Journal today? The guy sounds like a pompous ass. It's too bad that the ones paying the price for his arrogance are the former US West employees. Nacchio has sold over $300 million of Qwest stock and Qwest founder Philip Anschutz has sold about $2.5 billion.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.