“Shares of U.S. local telephone companies fell Thursday after federal regulators kept in place rules that force carriers to provide rivals with low-priced access to their telephone networks, analysts said.

In a complicated decision, the Federal Communications Commission approved new guidelines that give state regulators the power to decide what parts of local telephone networks must be leased at discounts. That dealt a blow to the dominant local telephone companies–the Baby Bells, which wanted immediate relief from rules they contend cost them money and customers.

The FCC decision, however, did offer the Baby Bells a partial win. The agency ruled that local companies that install new fiber-optic cables for high-speed Internet access won’t have to share those lines with rivals.” CNET News