Portugal Telecom: Isabel dos Santos seeking anti-trust approval in Portugal, Brazil for EUR 1.21bn offer
Isabel dos Santos, the private Angolan investor, wants to get swift regulatory approval in Portugal and Brazil for her EUR 1.21bn takeover bid on listed telco Portugal Telecom (PT), Diario Economico reported. Sources familiar with the process told the Lusophone paper that dos Santos will notify the AdC Portuguese Competition Authority later today (27 November) of her EUR 1.35 per share PT bid.
Terra Peregrin, dos Santos' holding company, has stipulated regulatory approval in Portugal and Brazil as a precondition to getting her PT offer registered with the CMVM Portuguese Securities Commission, the report said. The AdC has 30 working days to make a decision to clear her PT bid. But this deadline could be extended if the regulator requires more information from counterparties.
In her bid to get it registered, dos Santos will still have to justify the low price of her offer for PT, based on the firm's average share price six months before the launch of her takeover bid. The CMVM could nominate an independent auditor to fix a price if it does not agree with dos Santos' reasoning, the item said.
Meanwhile, Jornal de Negocios cited sources close to the situation as saying that dos Santos considers her EUR 1.35 per share PT bid as fair. PT's historic stock price cannot be used to value the telco due to PT's purchase of EUR 847m in defaulted debt from Rioforte, part of the collapsed Espirito Santo empire, according to the Angolan businesswoman.
Diario Economico, Jornal de Negocios