Deals
Telefonica Could List O2 This Year as Telxius IPO Progresses
- Carrier ready for U.K. unit’s IPO if market conditions right
- Selling a stake in O2 to strategic investor still an option
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Telefonica SA, moving forward with a sale of stock in its infrastructure business as it seeks to pare debt, could do the same with its British wireless unit O2 this year if market conditions are favorable, Chairman Jose Maria Alvarez-Pallete said.
“We have been working to list it, so if today or in the next few weeks we decided to do so, we could do it by year’s end,” Pallete said of O2 at a dinner with reporters Sunday in Santander, Spain. Selling a stake in the U.K. carrier to a strategic investor is also still an option, he said. “We could objectively do either one of the two things by year’s end. If markets closed, we would wait. We don’t have the obligation to list or sell at any price.”