T-Mobile Shares (NASDAQ: TMUS) Look Like an Opportunity

It's almost rhetorical to the point of being really obvious that the market these days has been volatile. Volatile, in fact, to the point where pinning down a course of action might seem all but impossible. For those looking to pull a little sidelined cash back into play, a good place to start might be with one of the biggest mobile providers in the US: T-Mobile (NASDAQ: TMUS).

Here's Your V-Shaped Recovery...Mostly

Looking at the last six months in T-Mobile stock makes one thing abundantly clear: this is a desirable equity. How can you tell? The charts will spell that much. Going into early 2020, T-Mobile was nearly a straight line with a slight cant upward. All throughout January, the stock's value remained in a band of value that represented about $2 in range, going from $77.32 the day before Christmas to $79.46 on February 3.

That kind of stability is important to those looking for value investing, especially if there are dividends involved. Sadly, there aren't any dividends on T-Mobile stock, but the stability might still be welcome anyway.

However, it's what happened in February forward that makes T-Mobile a story to watch. First, the stock started a frantic climb throughout the month of February, eventually clearing the $100 a share mark and making it an excellent consideration for growth investing. Then came March, and we all know what happened in March: that's right, the Massive Indiscriminate Coronavirus Sell-Off Event. T-Mobile wasn't immune to this either, despite the fact that it had about as much exposure to coronavirus as the boy in the bubble.

Before March was out, though, investors came to their senses and realized that T-Mobile was going to be one of the big companies going forward to drive the newly-minted telecommuting revolution. You know, the one that kept a lot of businesses from shutting down completely?

That was when T-Mobile started an upward track that hasn't actually stopped as of this writing. Sure, there have been some sawteeth in the graph from day to day—this is normal as profit-taking and rebalancing portfolios get involved—but when you go from a six-month low of $74.32 on March 18 (which wasn't even the 52-week low) to a close yesterday of $107.16, it's clear recovery is underway. The company is only $3.31 away from a new 52-week high.

SoftBank's Loss is Investors' Gain

Then came recent news out of SoftBank (OTCMKTS: SFTBY), which provided new opportunities for investors to get in. SoftBank sold $21 billion worth of T-Mobile stock, which SoftBank had by being the former majority owner of Sprint. When the Sprint and T-Mobile merger completed back on April 1, SoftBank wound up with 24.6 percent ownership of T-Mobile.

Great news for SoftBank, at least until a string of disasters emerged to make the T-Mobile move effectively forgotten. SoftBank has an arm known as the “Vision Fund”, a 12-figure operation that focuses on potential growth projects. When you note that it backed WeWork, you know how well the vision game has gone lately. That's left SoftBank in a bad position, and in need of cash. That led to it turning to its T-Mobile shares, and staging a monster sale, but one that only represents a portion of its stake.

T-Mobile Makes a Pretty Attractive Buy

The last three months for T-Mobile—actually the last six if you discount the coronavirus hit—make a compelling case to get in. Not only is one of its biggest shareholders dropping shares out of desperation for cash that has nothing to do with T-Mobile, but there's also already a line to scoop up some of that divestiture. Marcelo Claure, the former Sprint CEO and current T-Mobile director, personally agreed to buy five million shares from SoftBank himself.

What's more, we've been tracking 5G developments out here for a while now, and we know that T-Mobile is ahead of the 5G game by a long shot. While AT&T (NYSE:T) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) are still talking about their 5G presence in terms of a list of major cities, T-Mobile has a complete map, with colors, showing where their presence is. Based on even a casual comparison, T-Mobile is light-years ahead on bringing 5G connectivity to customers, and 5G is going to be the development that gets even fence-sitter's trading up their mobile devices.

Buying a piece of T-Mobile at this point almost looks like buying a piece of 5G, and considering everything 5G is slated to do, it's a property worth having. SoftBank's sale is providing an in, but who will rise to the offer?