Dish Network Corp is open to merging its satellite television business with AT&T Inc’s pay TV service DirecTV but the two companies have no active deal talks going on, according to a Bloomberg report seen by Reuters.
Shares of Dish rose as much as 6.3% after the report on Friday, while AT&T’s stock edged 1.9% higher.
Both Dish and DirecTV have been losing subscribers as viewers continue to shift to cheaper online streaming services such as Netflix Inc and Amazon.com Inc’s Prime service.
The Bloomberg report comes a day after brokerage UBS wrote a note outlining the benefits of a merger between Dish and DirecTV.
Dish and AT&T did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
Source: Reuters.com