The merger gods have their worshipers yearning for more deals going into year-end. The proposed merger of Sprint Corp. (NYSE: S) and T-Mobile US (NYSE: TMUS) is not exactly a new proposal. We have covered this on multiple occasions as the convergence of telecom, media and technology is not yet complete. What we are most interested in at this point is how the combined Sprint-T-Mobile would stack up against Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) and AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T).

For starters, Sprint serves more than 54 million customers through its brands of Sprint and former Nextel clients, as well as its prepaid brands of Virgin Mobile USA, Boost Mobile, and Assurance Wireless. T-Mobile US claims roughly 45 million wireless subscribers via T-Mobile and MetroPCS. Does this make an actual 99 million subscribers? Likely not because of double-counting and overlaps, but we are looking for a ballpark figure here.

Then there is the market capitalization game that has to be considered. Debt too. T-Mobile US is worth $19.3 billion and its total liabilities including debt, other liabilities, deferred charges, and the current liabilities comes to $33.3 billion. Sprint is worth some $33 billion and its most recent total liabilities under the same inclusion comes to $61.5 billion. Now keep in mind that both companies are effectively tracking stocks – Sprint under Softbank and T-Mobile under Deutsche Telekom.

AT&T’s website for its U.S. presence shows that it serves some 107.9 million wireless subscribers. AT&T’s market cap is $180 billion and its total liabilities are almost $189 billion.

Verizon’s latest earnings report showed 101.2 million total retail connections under its wireless efforts. Verizon is worth almost $139 billion in market cap and its total liabilities come to almost $242 billion now that it has closed upon its remaining Verizon Wireless stake.

Perhaps the greatest issue to consider yet again is that both Sprint and T-Mobile are effectively tracking stocks. Without Softbank, Sprint would be much weaker on its own. Without Deutsche Telekom, T-Mobile would perhaps not have had the capital base to be so aggressive in its new customer-friendly offerings. The next question to ask is how a combined entity with dominant parents out of Germany and Japan would fit into a regulatory hurdle in the United States.

If AT&T was blocked from acquiring T-Mobile as it was, would they tell the Department of Justice and the Federal Communications Commission that they feel threatened? Would Verizon say that the new competition is coming on just after it borrowed massive billions to acquire the rest of Verizon Wireless that it did not own? Now consider that the Federal Communications Commission and many taxing authorities may have money to lose if Verizon and/or AT&T were to be weakened by a competitor who jumped up so rapidly due to a merger. Then there are the post-merger layoffs and retail space closures that would have to be considered after the firms trimmed down on their overlaps.

The long and short of the matter is that drawing an Apples-to-Apples comparison is no simple task here. AT&T is now all AT&T and Verizon is now all Verizon. The same cannot be said about T-Mobile, nor about Sprint. Most things we have read recently and not so recently seem to signal that the networks would be able to be merged into one. We will avoid the questions on that matter for now because they are too many to handle quickly.

Another big issue is whether or not Dish Networks Corp. (NASDAQ: DISH) will really enter the fray here. The company has hinted at mergers on and off, but it has also said it would rather have a partnership with a carrier like Sprint or T-Mobile as they would get more leverage than with Verizon. DirecTV already has its ongoing pact with AT&T, with mixed fanfare over how that translates in part because of a lack of unified billing.

Stay tuned here because this may get very interesting. If a much more solid number-three carrier is formed, it will be a real competition for AT&T and Verizon. That carrier would also likely be under control of a foreign entity.

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