SpaceX to buy Grain Management's 800 MHz spectrum for reported $8B as AST SpaceMobile shares slide

SpaceX agrees to acquire Grain Management's 800 MHz spectrum

SpaceX said it agreed to buy Grain Management's nationwide 800 MHz spectrum portfolio, a low-band holding that Grain said on Thursday was being sold to SpaceX. The portfolio includes up to 14 megahertz of paired low-band spectrum, subject to Federal Communications Commission approval and other closing conditions, according to Stocktwits reporting summarized by Trend & Ticker. Financial terms were not disclosed in the announcement, but Cord Cutters News, citing reporting on the deal, put the transaction value at roughly $8 billion. SpaceX framed the acquisition as filling the remaining technical gap in Starlink Mobile's effort to become a major U.S. mobile carrier, pairing the low-band frequencies with the company's 2 GHz mid-band spectrum in a hybrid satellite-and-terrestrial architecture.

The deal removes an asset that AST SpaceMobile had also pursued. Grain Management had previously acquired 800 MHz spectrum from T-Mobile, and analysts said AST had been interested in the same licenses, as Trend & Ticker wrote. "This is the last critical piece of the spectrum puzzle needed for SpaceX to provide complete phone coverage in America," Elon Musk said on X, according to Stocktwits. Musk separately wrote that "to the casual observer, this won't seem like much. To those who understand the spectrum wars, it's an earthquake."

AST SpaceMobile shares slide on the competitive threat

AST SpaceMobile (ASTS) closed at $56.93 on Thursday, down 6.13% and its lowest close in more than a month, then slipped about 4% more after hours once the Grain deal was reported, according to Trend & Ticker and Stocktwits. By Friday afternoon the stock had extended the move, plunging about 15% to around $49, following the prior session's fall, as Tickeron and TipRanks reported. The slide followed an industry-wide sell-off that also pulled AT&T (T), T-Mobile US (TMUS) and Verizon Communications (VZ) lower in overnight trading, each down roughly 6%, Stocktwits reported. The Tickeron blog noted that broader U.S. equity indices traded slightly higher on the day, framing the decline as stock- and sector-specific rather than market-wide.

Reacting to the deal on X, AST SpaceMobile chair and CEO Abel Avellan wrote that, with current satellites in orbit and in build, U.S. partners "will access critical low-band and mid-band spectrum that no one can match," as quoted by TipRanks. Avellan pointed to roughly 1,000 MHz of low- and mid-band spectrum held by AST's mobile carrier partners, combined with the company's own 45 MHz of L-band spectrum, and said users "will see peak data rates of nearly 200 Mbps from the largest-ever satellites in low Earth orbit."

FCC waiver lets SpaceX build a direct-to-device constellation without a carrier partner

Pressure on AST SpaceMobile intensified after an FCC order dated October 6, numbered DA 26-1078, waived a rule that would have required SpaceX to pair its direct-to-phone network with a wireless carrier, Trend & Ticker reported, citing Telecompetitor. The order authorized SpaceX to deploy a 15,000-satellite direct-to-device constellation orbiting 326 to 335 kilometers up, using 15 MHz of uplink and 50 MHz of downlink spectrum drawn from SpaceX's pending purchase of EchoStar airwaves. The waiver cannot be passed to a future buyer of the spectrum, SpaceX cannot use the airwaves until the EchoStar deal closes, though it can test during launch, and 911 routing is still required, Trend & Ticker wrote. Because two FCC bureaus issued the order, the full commission can still review it.

Analysts said the regulatory move undercuts AST's carrier-dependent business model, which relies on partnerships with AT&T and Verizon to reach subscribers, as Tickeron and Trend & Ticker reported. The full FCC is scheduled to meet on October 29 to vote on proposals that include 482 MHz of spectrum for satellite service to phones, according to Trend & Ticker.

Other developments

Telecom analyst Roger Entner of Recon Analytics, who predicted the Starlink-Grain deal in August, said "Ligado is next" after the announcement, pointing to AST's definitive agreements with Ligado for long-term access to up to 45 MHz of lower mid-band spectrum in the U.S. and Canada. Those agreements call for a $550 million payment contingent on closing and at least $80 million in annual L-band spectrum access payments, Stocktwits reported. Separately, Tickeron flagged lingering overhangs on ASTS, including a recent analyst downgrade, launch delays, a BlueBird 7 write-off and securities class actions, as additional pressure on the stock beyond the SpaceX competitive angle.

The full FCC's October 29 meeting, with 482 MHz of additional satellite-to-phone spectrum on its agenda, is the next verifiable milestone for the direct-to-device competitive picture.