Sprint, T-Mobile agree to merge to form $146 billion company

The combined company will use the T-Mobile name and Sprint shareholders will get 0.10256 T-Mobile shares for each Sprint share they own. T-Mobile majority shareholder Deutsche Telekom will own about 42% of the combined company, while SoftBank (which owns a controlling interest in Sprint) will own 27%, while the public will hold the remaining 31%.

T-Mobile CEO John Legere will run the combined entity, with Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure joining the board.

The deal is expected to close next year, assuming regulators sign off. Of note, there is no regulatory break-up fee to either company if it gets vetoed.

Consumer impact: How consumers will fare is less clear. As much smaller rivals, Sprint and T-Mobile both competed aggressively on price. T-Mobile also led a number of industrywide shifts, including the moves away from subsidized smartphones and two-year contracts.

By the numbers: AT&T and Verizon would still be larger than the combined company, by number of subscribers, but not by much. Together, Sprint and T-Mobile have just under 30% of those who get service from one of the major carriers, compared to 38% for Verizon and 33% for AT&T, according to telecom analyst Roger Entner.

History Lesson: AT&T agreed to buy T-Mobile back in 2011, but pulled the deal once it became clear regulators would never approve it. That forced AT&T to hand over billions in cash along with valuable wireless spectrum to T-Mobile, helping fuel some of its recent success.

• Sprint and T-Mobile have held talks a number of times, scrapping the effort under President Obama after regulators signaled they would not allow it. The talks restarted after Donald Trump took office, but stalled over issues related to who would control the combined company.
• An FCC spokesman declined to comment “on potential or announced transactions.” The Justice Department also declined to comment.

More: Sprint and T-Mobile's pitch to D.C.: Good for America.

• "After nearly a month of stonewalling, it appears clear that the President has chosen the path of defiance, obstruction, and cover-up," the letter reads.

The state of play: Several White House officials have told Axios' Alayna Treene that the administration has no plans of complying with the committees' demands for interviews or documents without a full House vote formally approving an impeachment inquiry.

The big picture: The Trump administration's initial refusal to turn over the whistleblower complaint on the president's interactions with Ukraine is what led House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to finally support a formal impeachment inquiry.

Go deeper: Trump letter dares Pelosi to hold vote on impeachment inquiry

• Johnson asked the Justice Department earlier this week to look into links between Ukraine and Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign. His letter questioned the narrative that Biden's actions in Ukraine had nothing to do with his son's connection.
• However, it was also discovered that he signed onto a 2016 letter that mirrored Biden's work to reform Ukraine's prosecutor general and judiciary.
• There is no evidence that Biden's reform work in Ukraine was to protect his son's business dealings, as the president and some of his allies allege, or that he committed any form of corruption.

The state of play: Sondland, a Trump political appointee who donated $1 million to the president's inaugural committee, denied that there was a quid pro quo between the Trump administration and Ukraine's government in a series of text messages that former Ukraine special envoy Kurt Volker provided to a group of House committees investigating the Trump-Ukraine matter.

• "I think it’s crazy to withhold security assistance for help with a political campaign," Bill Taylor, the top U.S. diplomat to Ukraine, texted Sondland.
• Sondland texted back: "Bill, I believe you are incorrect about President Trump's intentions. The President has been crystal clear no quid pro quo's of any kind."
• The New York Times reported that Sondland's response came only after he spoke to the president.

Go deeper: House committees release texts from former Ukraine envoy Kurt Volker