Both companies are similarly valued if you look at market capitalization plus debt as a ratio of earnings before accounting charges, a common valuation tool for telecom firms.

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Were it not for this bit of accounting legerdemain, the true Debt to GDP ratio would show up as a ratio of 119 percent.

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These find that, when the ratio (suitably adjusted to take care of accounting discrepancies) moves far above one, equilibrium is indeed eventually restored not, however, by a surge in the replacement value of companies' assets but by a correspondingly dramatic fall in the value that Wall Street places on them.

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