The chairman of the US' Federal Communications Commission said the troubled WorldCom Inc would be allowed to be taken over by a smaller, regional phone company, signalling a move reversing a long-held anti-trust stance.
Such a decision could revive the spirit of monopoly that reigned at former telecommunications giant AT&T before it was broken up by court order in 1984 into several small, regional so-called "Baby Bell" phone companies. The FCC regulates broadcast, media and communications markets.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Michael Powell told the Wall Street Journal that "utter crisis" in the telecommunications industry brought about by a wave of bankruptcies, accounting scandals, and plunging stock prices could necessitate a return to the practice of allowing one company to control large parts of two or more markets.
Powell said the industry's beleaguered, debt-ridden condition had left regulators with little choice but to consider such options, especially if the alternatives would disrupt phone and data services to WorldCom's 20 million customers.
"There are plenty of doctrines in anti-trust [anti-monopoly] and competition policy that would take into consideration the duress and state of the market," Powell said.
Powell served as a top anti-trust official in the Clinton administration's Justice Department.
"If a Bell company brought a deal to us, that would certainly be part of the consideration," he said in his first public comments on the unfolding WorldCom scandal.
Powell also called for the federal government to continue billions of dollars in contracts with WorldCom, rather than pulling back, as some White House officials have advised.
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