Perhaps taking a cue from “Lord of the Rings: Return of the King,” the Federal Communications Commission’s 700 MHz auction is teasing us with the potential that it could all be over very shortly. New bids dropped to double digits during the three opening rounds today with new potential winning bids falling to just $3.7 million during round 66. Total potential winning bids stood at $19.383 billion following the round.
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The final three rounds yesterday slowed from 115 new bids during round 61, to 112 in round 62 and 107 during round 63. The lethargy continued this morning with round 64 garnering only 98 new bids, slowing to 86 new bids in round 65 and 79 new bids in round 66. The auction previously dipped below the 100 new bid mark in rounds 34 and 35 before the FCC instituted its “Stage Two Transition,” that required bidders to remain a higher percentage of bids in play to maintain eligibility. The move worked as new bids shot up to more than 200 during round 36, but have since began a steady decline.
FCC auction rules indicate that the proceedings will end once no new bids are placed during a round. The advanced wireless services auction did manage to hold on for just under 100 rounds after falling below 100 new bids per round.
Only a handful of licenses continued to draw more than one bid during any of the six rounds, with only the A Block covering Salisbury, Md.; and the B Block covering Vineland, N.J., receiving a pair of bids during round 66.
While the E-Block licenses continued to get a majority of new bids during the past six rounds, a pair of the smaller C-Block licenses also received new bids. The block covering American Samoa received a new bid during round 61 that was usurped in round 66 with a new high bid of $19,000, while the C-Block license covering Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands picked up a new bid of $391,000 in round 66.
The FCC has not said whether it would increase the number of rounds held per day, which is currently at half a dozen. The FCC moved bidding during the AWS auction steadily up to 14 rounds per day to expedite the proceedings.
