I'm hearing rumors AT&T wants to close the Lumen deal before the end of the year. This might explain why.
AT&T announced yesterday that they will pay EchoStar $23 billion in cash to acquire a portion of EchoStar's wireless spectrum licenses, specifically 30 MHz of mid-band (3.45 GHz) and 20 MHz of low-band (600 MHz) spectrum - the deal is expected to close sometime in mid-2026