EUR 9636.00 For Business Accounts Only

NSR Policy: Update on BEAD, USF, and State Low Income Initiatives

In the last week, there have been several developments that will affect how governments approach achieving universal broadband access and affordability, with each fork in the road leading to potential gains and losses among publicly traded communications enterprises. These developments include the formal nomination of a Cruz staffer to head NTIA (with her views on the critical issues well telegraphed in advance), follow up questions to the next Commerce Secretary reflecting some bipartisan concern about diverting money from fiber to satellites and potential pauses in the BEAD program, another record high for the USF Contribution Factor, and states considering legislation similar to New York as a method to address the affordability problem for low income homes in the wake of the end of the Affordable Connectivity Program (with such efforts likely to be the government action that has the most potential to cause investor concern). In this note, we analyze the implications for investors of each of these developments.