That's the question being posed by SeekingAlpha contributor M&A Researcher, as the FCC still has not started its review "clock" just yet.

They point out that there has been an unusually long delay from application filing to clock start, but given the magnitude and publicity surrounding the Sirius-XM merger, maybe it's not all that surprising.

No new filings have been posted to the FCC's transaction page in the last seven days. It could be an indication that the staff is preparing to launch the review clock shortly, or maybe that the volume of filings coming in is so large that the staff simply is unable to keep up.

Either way, another batch of ex parte filings can be expected to appear shortly, as can the beginning of the 180-day informal review period. Tick-tock.

[SeekingAlpha]