The 5 Dumbest Things on Wall Street: May 9

4. Sprint to the Finish

Sprint Nextel (S Quote) shareholders have suffered mightily since Sprint's ill-fated decision to pay $35 billion to buy Nextel in 2005.

The company has lost over half its value since the deal was consummated, and it has lost roughly 1.2 million subscribers amid outrageously bad customer service and a pathetic lack of integration between the two businesses. It recently wrote off most of the $35 billion investment in Nextel as an outright loss.

Luckily, The Wall Street Journal reports that Deutsche Telekom (DT Quote) may ask its shareholders to pony up for an equally bad deal and buy Sprint after Sprint sells Nextel to a consortium of investors organized by its co-founder, Morgan O'Brien.

Sprint Nextel shareholders would no doubt be delighted to wash their hands of this mess, but given their losses, they'll be sure to demand a hefty price tag in compensation. Meanwhile, Deutsche Telekom shareholders will be led down the primrose path by Wall Street bankers who stand to enjoy a windfall of fees as a result of the new combination.

Deutsche Telekom, which owns the fourth-largest U.S. wireless carrier, T-Mobile, will trumpet the deal as a chance to push into high-speed wireless market known as 4G and become the largest wireless carrier in the nation, with more than 74 million subscribers. That would put it ahead of AT&T (T Quote) and Verizon (VZ Quote).

Shareholders may want to consider how long it will take those subscribers to start jumping off the sinking ship they're about to pay for.

Dumb-o-meter score: 68. When in doubt, do a telecom deal.