We are exploring opportunities to separate portions of our switched voice operations into separate companies or tracking stocks,

WorldCom condemns unauthorized carrier switches, and we cooperated fully with the FCC's review, ... The incidents highlighted by the FCC were perpetrated by a few sales employees, who have since been terminated.

We have now hit the ground running with new products and we will soon be in full stride as one company.

The merger will greatly expand our total number of local networks and advance our entrance into more secondary cities by as much as two years,

The benefits of this merger are compelling for the stockholders of both MCI and WorldCom -- powerful synergies and ownership in the best performing communications stock over the past decade. This merger is about growth -- value for stockholders, enhanced products and services for customers and new opportunities for employees,

Our core strengths are very complementary.