The cabinet might opt for a dual-track sale process for CT by preparing a placement on the stock exchange while collecting preliminary bids from strategic investors to see if it could get a majority premium. If there is no interest from strategic investors, it would go for a capital market transaction. The National Property Fund’s vice-chairman Pavel Kuta repeated that the government has already asked several telecoms companies to express an interest and confirmed that both Swisscom and TDC have shown an interest. Other companies that reportedly feature on the Cabinet’s list of potential bidders include Telenor, TeliaSonera, France Telecom and Telekom Austria. However, Telekom Austria told us that the Czech Republic is not in its area of focus. The prime minister’s economic advisor Jan Mladek said that even if the capital market option is chosen, the sale would be carried out in April 2005 at the earliest, once the audited 2004 financial results would be available. The Cabinet is expected to make its final decision on the privatization form on Wednesday, December 1. Source: Dow Jones, Reuters, Mlada Fronta
Tomáš Gatěk, Patria Finance