2 merging companies

hah2110 said: "Hey everyone, my name is Harrison. I really apologize if this is in the wrong forum. It is just a question about stocks in general. My friend and I are starting to get into stocks. Here is our question. Nextel and Sprint are merging and their new stock ticker will become "S". What happens when they merge? The merge is final and they start the new ticker monday morning. Does that mean as the market opens Monday morning we have to buy ticker S immediately? What about if we buy sprint or nextel now? If we buy sprint now, since they are acquiring nextel, does nextel's money just add ontop of sprint's? How does this all work when companies merge? Thanks, Harrison"

HappyHarry said: "Hi Harrison, When companies merge, they determine what will happen to the old stocks and the old symbols. Generally, all the outstanding stock of a company will be recalled and converted into the new trading shares."

crusadex said: "Sprint might be a good bet for investing.I think if you look into their track record with their customers you might think twice.The way their contracts are written up pretty much insure that they can lie cheat and steal from their customers with imunity,and trust me they do.In the short term it may make them alot of money but long term they are going to lose one customer at a time.Sprint needs to learn what bussiness ethics are.As long as their customer service is incentive based the people who are suppsosed to be offering excellent service will be more concerned with getting thier bonus for selling that extra option.Sadly it cost alot of sprint customers alot of money everyday wrongfully.Before you buy walk into a sprint store and just listen to the customers. Will"