Dish Network’s wireless dream turns nightmarish for creditors

Bondholders had long been fretting about Charlie Ergen’s Dish Network Corp. His latest move turned those fears into a nightmare.

A bid to transition once-mighty Dish from its shrinking pay-TV niche to wireless services made strategic sense, sure. And Ergen, known for clinching last-minute deals and navigating tricky financial situations, just succeeded in recombining Dish with his healthier satellite operator, EchoStar.

But it still has to compete with established giants in the wireless arena, meet federal deadlines to build out its 5G network and fund those expensive initiatives. That’s a conundrum for a company with more than $20 billion of debt, several billion dollars of which is coming due in a hurry. The market remained worried.