ETB Surges as Shares Seen Nearly Doubling in 2012: Bogota Mover

Empresa de Telecomunicaciones de Bogota SA, the phone company serving Colombia’s capital, rose the most in a month after brokerage Valores Bancolombia said shares may almost double in price this year.

ETB, as the company is known, rose 9.3 percent to 520 pesos at 3:15 p.m. in Bogota, the biggest gain since Jan. 12. The benchmark IGBC Index advanced 0.3 percent.

Valores Bancolombia set a 2012 year-end target price of 900 pesos, estimating operating profit and revenue will increase 2 percent this year to 256 billion pesos ($144 million) and 1.5 trillion pesos, respectively. If the company maintains its distribution policy it could have one of the country’s highest dividend returns, “an attractive factor for investors with high risk tolerance,” Bogota-based analyst Samuel David Garcia wrote in a report to clients today.

The risks include the unknown details of Bogota mayor-elect Gustavo Petro’s proposal to create a holding company for ETB and other public utilities, the report said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Blake Schmidt in Bogota at Bschmidt16@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: David Papadopoulos at papadopoulos@bloomberg.net