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Rubbish article in my opinion, just speculation with some charting thrown in. Over the last five years, Telecom stocks have been rubbish performers, which is strange since the FAANG's/Tech stocks are totally dependent on them.
This five year chart show the performance of Telefonica, BT, and Vodafone as within 10% of each other, but all three down more than 50%, Orange down over 30%; DT has outperformed all of them, up 16%, possibly due to T-Mobile.

https://www.google.com/finance/quote/DTE:ETR?window=5Y&comparison=LON%3ABT.A%2CLON%3AVOD%2CBME%3ATEF%2CEPA%3AORA

My point is that the sector has generally performed badly; DT seems to be the exception and BT is the worst performer, but not by as much as some may think.

"The bottom third of the Dax includes Deutsche Telekom with a downward trend of 4.52 percent.

An hour and a half before the end of trading in Frankfurt, the value of the Bonn telecommunications company was quoted at EUR 16.81, while the closing price on the last trading day was EUR 17.61. According to an unclear trend, Deutsche Telekom is now on the downside, and it remains to be seen whether the losses will continue.
With 39th place and a downward movement of 4.52%, Deutsche Telekom is currently only in the lower third of the Dax, which is down by a total of 1.32%."

https://www.digitaldaily.de/2021/10/06/aktie_ddna-2021-10-06-16-deutsche-telekom/

It's the markets init Guv.

Just had another read through your previous "analysis", and don't understand how you feel 6G, Starlink, BT's, I.T. systems, etc, etc are in any way a threat to BT's future. I get that you take certain views since the market appears to have it in for BT, but the current share price has no bearing on how successful BT will be in the future.

6G/Starlink is absolutely no threat to BT. The scientists and Engineers can only successfully transmit an omnidirectional 100G bandwidth over a couple of meters. Terabit upper mmwave RF communications are in the distant future, and unlikely to even work directionally if it rains, even using n-dimensional orthogonal polarization lol.

"wonder what the SP would be without the buyback? 80p"

They're only purchasing 5.7 Million shares a day, out of a daily average volume of 64.6 Million shares, so around 8.8% of the daily volume. The shares are also purchased in such a way as to avoid price movement. VOD wouldn't be purchasing these shares if it wasn't in their interest, it makes more sense to eventually pay the MCB holder's through treasury shares, rather than diluting the stock later. No company likes to see their share price tank, but it probably suits Vodafone on this occasion.

Something else to consider, if Sky were looking at jumping into bed with VMO2, Sky didn't do them any favours with their Equinox response.

Sky's response to the Equinox offer:

"Sky agrees with Ofcom’s provisional conclusion that the Equinox Offer will not have a material adverse impact on competition and that Ofcom should take no action at this time"

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0026/225593/sky.pdf

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0026/222983/Sky.pdf

VMO2's view:

"We remain of the view, however, that Openreach’s new price plan (“Equinox”) is likely to harm competition and undermine Ofcom’s strategic objective."

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0028/225595/virgin-media-o2.pdf

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/222986/VirginO2.pdf

"Next couple of weeks will tell us, but a wholesale deal with VMO2 doesn’t look like it’s in VMO2’s TV or Broadband businesses interest to me? So it will indicate something else? I think press are missing this crucial point"

If you're implying that Comcast will takeover VMO2, I don't see it. Why would Comcast be interested in VMO2, when they could bid for BT and leave all their current customers in place? BT is dealing with its legacy infrastructure, with most of it gone by 2026, while VMO2 will have many customers still served via DOCSIS network.If you read through the links in various posts, VMO2's £100 cost per customer Fibre upgrade, of the existing network, only covers the rollout to the cabinet, it's estimated that an additional cost of £300 will be required to get it to the customer premise. Sky will do whatever makes the most business sense for them, any decision they make wont be dependant on past relationships if it doesn't add up.
As far as cable technology in general, the future appears to have been written as far as DOCSIS is concerned, and it's bleak; This is backed up by VMO2's decision to drop DOCSIS after the current 3.1 upgrade, gradually moving to an FTTP operating model.

"So you’re saying they will just shut down their broadband division as they won’t need it? Really?"

I've no idea what they'll do, they may decide to continue operating an ISP service with Sky included, and offer a subscription streaming service separately, I can only guess. I'm on Sky Go now and watching Hitmen Reloaded in between posting on here, so they already support a streaming service of sorts. I suppose much will depend on how they want to operate going forward. You don't need an IPTV box for a streaming service, but a box or TV with an encryption card protects Sky from piracy, or users sharing the password/log in credentials with other family members.

"How will they serve their broadband customers?"
They wouldn't need to offer broadband service. using a subscription model.

"So how will they deliver the content to customers that’s better than fibre? 5G? Surely not.."

The same way Netflix does, except you pay subscriptions based on which packages you want. They could offer the same channels, but over the internet rather than via a dish. Whether you have a box, or just stream directly will depend on how they decide to offer it.

If Sky decide to move to an online IPTV operating model, they could decide to move to subscription only service eventually, which means they wouldn't need to rely on any wholesale deals, or Fibre partnerships. The announcement's on Thursday apparently.

"They certainly have moved quickly and seem hungry for growth
Telefónica always impresses me....i wouldnt under-estimate their input into anything...they are up to many things"

They really are moving quickly; As I said, VM wouldn't have agreed an MVNO deal with Vodafone in Nov 2019, if a merger with O2 was even being considered at that time. The question should be, why did both companies feel the need to push this through at Lightning speed? No reference to "Project Lightning" there lol. How did they manage to do due diligence so quickly too? I've seen articles stating that Telefonica has recently hired investment banks Barclays and LionTree to seek a partner to finance VMO2's fibre rollout, which begs the question as to why one of the parents need to do this, rather than VMO2 raising their own finance? Like I said in my previous post, it all seems a bit desperate to me.

"There is simply no way they do this. Bedding down an acquisition / merger is hard and most fail. And the CEO wants to reshape their strategy. So going into wholesale is biting off far too much IMO."

The VM and O2 businesses are fundamentally different, so it's just a case of bolting them together i'd guess; The decision to merge must have been extremely rushed though, otherwise VM wouldn't have tied themselves into an MVNO deal with Vodafone in November 2019, with the merger announcement coming in May 2020, around 6 months later.
As far as running a wholesale business, i'd guess they'll have to set up billing systems, offer SLA's, have systems in place to give remote Network Access to the various Network Operations Centres utilising their Network, etc, etc, etc. BT's wholesale business is fine tuned, but it should be since it's evolved over the last 20 years. To run a wholesale business successfully, VMO2 will have to prove they can emulate BT's offering at a cheaper price, which I'm guessing will be quite difficult; Add the fact that VMO2 will take more time to migrate to FTTP, with less geographic coverage, i'd guess they'll struggle to make a wholesale offering successful. They could target a few big ISP's, to have large volumes with a few wholesale customers, but what will that do to their own customer base, and how will they tempt the big ISP's over from BT? Since i'll be surprised if they can undercut BT on price.
The headlines make it seem really simple, but building a wholesale business from scratch seems quite difficult to me.
Some of the recent history of VMO2 has a feel of desperation; A rushed merger, a decision to abandon DOCSIS after the 3.1 upgrade, the £18 Billion in debt they are lumbered with, and talk of investing a further £10 Billion in FTTP rollout when they only pull in half the revenue of BT. I wonder which, and why, vested interests may be pushing the various narratives, is it to depress BT's share price? Is it to suck in new partners to fund VMO2's rollout? Or a bit of both? Or am I just a conspiracy theorist? lol

Thanks for that Poker, the Call options significantly outnumber the Put options though.

Dec 21 Call 53,022 Put 4,007

"I suspect that there has been some Financial derivatives placed such as Put Options (and maybe CfD's ) which when they increase lead to market sells ..as they tend to indicate the how the futures market sees things"

I agree, I was of the same thinking and it's backed up by the large increase in volumes on the 17th September (Quadruple Witching Day).

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vTsTa4mxT8tj5auXuLo5IjUdhVtXIkdcmupSBob3N7-QDnUymI_WbfVmowH0UQoZFr0KderADoq3RDN/pubchart?oid=156812212&format=interactive

On the 24th June BT was over 205p, currently sitting around 151p, a drop of 26% in less than 4 months.
If there's something wrong with BT, where were the shorters? I've not seen any notified short positions since Blackrock on the 5th Feb, when the share price was around 124p. If the market's so clever, why didn't they see the rise to 205p, or the subsequent fall to 151p? If big players were unloading their positions, there'd be associated RNS's, so that doesn't appear to be happening.

"BT and Tosh build quantum-secured metro fibre optic network"

"UK ISP BT and partner Toshiba have today announced that they intend to build the “world’s first” quantum-secured metro fibre optic network between commercial sites in London.
The system will adopt ultra-secure communications via the use of Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) and Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) encryption.
Last year the two companies succeeded in establishing the UK’s first “industrial deployment” of a quantum-secure network using Openreach’s “standard” fibre optic infrastructure, and since then they’ve also tested it with hollow core fibre cables."

https://www.fudzilla.com/news/network/53652-bt-and-tosh-build-quantum-secured-metro-fibre-optic-network

Secure communications are going to be critical in the future, especially around IOT applications like self driving vehicles, Drones, and other ultra secure uses.

"Reckon sale of BT Sports to DAZN announced by the end of this month, followed by BT Trustees buying into the pension plan and all sorts of good stuff come December and January re Drahi and DT."

I think it'll be a good few years before the Pension Trustees make a move to takeover the BTPS. The deficit is probably too high at the moment, but everything points to this happening in the next 4 to 10 years; My reason for believing this is an interview Frank Naylor gave in January.
He said:
“We see our role as managing the funding risk in the scheme, and building towards a DIY buyout,”

https://www.ipe.com/interviews/how-we-run-our-money-bt-pension-scheme/10049824.article

My other reason, for thinking a DIY buyout is a certainty, is the set up of a Co Investment vehicle protecting BT should the Pension scheme go into surplus.

"From 1 July 2023 to 30 June 2030 payments of £600m pa which BT can choose to pay either directly to BTPS or to a new co-investment vehicle.
To the extent there is a funding deficit at 30 June 2034, the co-investment vehicle will pay funds to BTPS
Any remaining funds in the co-investment vehicle are returned to BT if not deemed needed by BTPS following assessments in 2034 to 2036"

https://www.btps.co.uk/NewsDetail?a=43

What's interesting, is that the "£600m pa" payments could start going into the Co Investment vehicle from "1 July 2023", which may indicate a possibility of BTPS going into surplus from that date onwards. Should the pension swing into surplus early, everything could change in the next Triennial review, with possible movement toward a "DIY buyout".

Looking at the Telecom stocks performance, over the last couple of years, you'd think it's a dying industry like Newspaper printing. If Telecoms is such a rubbish prospect, why are Billions being sunk into alternative operators by the likes of Goldman Sachs, etc?
The Altnets lack scale and are effectively one trick ponies, with their entire income dependent on wholesale, or direct customer broadband revenue. The Altnets don't have a significant backbone capability, so I'm guessing they rely heavily on incumbent Telecom providers for backbone services.
Many of the Altnets will probably disappear, due to competitive pricing, and the general view is that they'll be hovered up by the likes of CityFibre and VMO2; Integration and backbone connectivity costs for more rural entities may not be economically viable for CityFibre to integrate, so would these small rural Altnets be taken over by Openreach?
Much is made of the competitive background, but the Equinox controversy highlights the Altnets dependency on regulation, compelling BT to not compete on price. At some point in the future BT are going to argue that competition from VMO2 will have reached a critical mass, and Ofcom will have no option but to unshackle BT, which will allow BT to compete fully on price; What will that do to the smaller Altnets?

This article echo's many of my views expressed in historic posts.

https://www.lightreading.com/opticalip/fttx/sky-investment-in-virgin-fiber-rollout-may-not-add-up/d/d-id/772528