AST SpaceMobile shares extended their selloff Friday after SpaceX agreed to buy the nationwide 800 MHz spectrum portfolio that AST had also shown interest in acquiring.
ASTS was trading around $49.13 at 12:53 p.m. ET on October 9, down 13.7% from Thursday’s $56.93 close, after falling as low as $47.57. The stock had already dropped 6.1% during Thursday’s regular session and then slid roughly another 4% after hours when the SpaceX-Grain Management transaction was announced.
Grain said October 8 that SpaceX had entered a definitive agreement to acquire 100% of its nationwide 800 MHz portfolio. The transaction still requires Federal Communications Commission approval and other customary closing conditions.
FinanceFeeds covered the same transaction from the SpaceX and U.S. carrier side earlier Friday, including the sharp response in Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile.
AST Had Been Interested in the Grain Spectrum
AST’s exposure to the news is more direct than simply being another satellite company competing with Starlink.
Bloomberg reported in August, citing people familiar with the discussions, that both SpaceX and AST SpaceMobile had expressed interest in acquiring Grain’s 800 MHz licenses. Those frequencies are attractive for direct-to-device services because low-band spectrum provides wide coverage and stronger building penetration.
SpaceX ultimately secured the deal.
That does not cancel AST’s existing commercial relationships with AT&T and Verizon. AT&T has a definitive commercial agreement with AST for space-based cellular broadband, while Verizon signed its own commercial agreement for direct-to-cellular AST service. T-Mobile, by contrast, currently uses SpaceX’s Starlink for its satellite connectivity offering.
Why Ligado Is Now the Asset to Watch
AST also has a separate spectrum arrangement with Ligado Networks, and that is where telecom analyst Roger Entner says attention should now turn.
Entner, who had predicted a Starlink-Grain transaction in August, told Stocktwits after Thursday’s announcement that “Ligado is next.” That is his assessment, not an announced transaction or evidence that AST’s Ligado deal is changing.
AST’s existing agreement gives it long-term access to as much as 45 MHz of lower mid-band spectrum in the United States and Canada for direct-to-device satellite applications.
According to AST’s SEC filings, closing requires regulatory approvals and other conditions. AST would pay Ligado approximately $550 million at closing and then at least $80 million annually for L-band spectrum usage rights, alongside long-term revenue-sharing arrangements.
The Grain loss therefore removes one potential spectrum path without removing AST’s broader spectrum strategy.
AT&T and Verizon Still Have a Reason to Back AST
Entner also pointed to the recently formed satellite venture involving AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile, describing the carriers’ objective as wanting “an open standard, not an Elon standard.”
Again, that is Entner’s interpretation. What is established is that the carriers’ existing satellite agreements remain in place, meaning AT&T and Verizon retain their AST relationships while T-Mobile continues working with Starlink.
The question for AST investors is now whether Ligado and its carrier partnerships can provide enough spectrum depth to offset the strategic option that disappeared when Grain chose SpaceX.
That question lands while ASTS was already a highly volatile stock. FinanceFeeds’ recent AST SpaceMobile valuation analysis set out a $96 bull case and $44 bear case, with satellite deployment pace as the central operating variable.
Friday’s move has brought the stock much closer to that lower scenario. This time, however, the catalyst is spectrum: SpaceX won an asset AST had considered, while the market is now asking how much strategic weight AST’s still-unclosed Ligado arrangement must carry.