By Elvira Pollina MILAN, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Poste Italiane is weighing options to keep a big stake in Telecom Italia (TIM), including selling its broadband arm to the former phone monopoly in exchange
Poste Italiane Weighs Broadband Sale to Keep TIM Stake
By Elvira Pollina
MILAN, Dec 5 (Reuters) - Poste Italiane is weighing options to keep a big stake in Telecom Italia (TIM), including selling its broadband arm to the former phone monopoly in exchange for shares, three people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
State-backed Poste, which runs mail, parcel, payments, energy and broadband services, became TIM's largest shareholder this year with a 24.8% stake after buying stock from state lender CDP and France's Vivendi. The stake is just below a 25% threshold that would trigger a buyout.
Poste does not plan a takeover but wants to stay near a new 30% buyout threshold the government is set to introduce under a financial code reform, one of the people said.
Options include selling its PosteMobile unit to TIM in a deal that could see Poste receiving TIM ordinary shares as payment, the three people said, declining to be named as the information is not public.
Extra shares would help offset the effect of a potential conversion of TIM's savings shares into ordinary stock, which would cut Poste's current stake to about 17%, the sources said.
No decision has been made on any deal or timing, the sources added. Poste and TIM declined to comment.
PosteMobile, which struck a deal to use TIM's mobile network starting next year, serves about five million customers and could be worth around 900 million euros ($1.1 billion), according to Intermonte analysts.
Another option under review is buying Vivendi's remaining 2.5% stake, worth about 200 million euros at current prices, according to LSEG data. Vivendi declined to comment.
($1 = 0.8568 euros)
(Reporting by Elvira Pollina. Editing by Mark Potter)
