Both a consortium of the Italian state development bank CDP (Cassa Depositi e Prestiti) and the Australian investment bank Macquarie, as well as the US financial investor KKR (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts) had submitted bids, the company said on Friday evening in Rome. The company has been looking for a buyer for some time. According to information from the Bloomberg news agency, the group had rejected previous bids as too low. They are said to have been between 19 and 21 billion euros. Major shareholder and media group Vivendi values the division up for sale at around 30 billion euros. In view of rising interest rates, TIM wants to reduce its high mountain of debt.
TIM major shareholder Vivendi rejects offers from development bank and KKR
According to insiders, the media group Vivendi, as a major shareholder of the Italian telecom group TIM, has rejected both offers for its fixed-line division. Both the offer from the US financial investor KKR (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts), which was increased before the weekend, and the offer from the Italian development bank were rejected, the Bloomberg news agency reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter. KKR had only pimped up its offer on Friday and would put around 23 billion euros on the table if all conditions were met. Shortly after the stock market opened on Monday, Tim shares initially fell by around two percent, but then largely recovered.
Tim has been looking for a new owner for his landline for a long time. Vivendi values the division at around 30 billion euros, significantly more than KKR and the consortium of the Italian state development bank CDP (Cassa Depositi e Prestiti) and the Australian investment bank Macquarie have offered so far. According to Bloomberg, the consortium was ready to pay almost 20 billion euros for the division.
In view of rising interest rates, Tim wants to reduce his high mountain of debt. The group had already asked interested parties to make new offers in the past, as the existing ones were not yet “adequate”.
The TIM share temporarily lost 0.96 percent to EUR 0.2483 in Milan.
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