Shareholders of Tele2 are considering the transfer of the operator under the control of Rostelecom

Shareholders of Tele2 mobile operator are considering the possibility of transferring the company to Rostelecom’s control through the sale of a part of shares, Vedomosti reports with reference to Yury Solovyev, first deputy chairman of the board of VTB Bank. According to him, VTB does not intend to fully sell Tele2, but is considering options for changing its stake in the operator.

Now mobile operator Tele2 is 45% owned by Rostelecom. The rest of the company's securities are held by Russia Holding AB, which comprises VTB. The bank itself owns half of the Tele2 holdings.

Shareholders hope that the change of government at Rostelecom will allow Tele2 to implement the cross-offers, which were initially relied upon. That is why the telecom operator was brought in as an owner and partner.

The problem is that, in its current form, Tele2 is difficult to compete with the Big Three operators, and a different board in the mobile operator and telecom operator reduces the efficiency of interaction between the companies. Shareholders plan that under the management of Rostelecom, Tele2 has more prospects due to more powerful support of the telecom operator.

“We passed the hardest time, the highest interest rates, the biggest CAPEX in the hardest competition ... When we exchanged mobile assets with Rostelecom, we had a hope that companies could work efficiently. Unfortunately, the shareholder structure does not allow us to realize this synergy completely, ”Interfax quoted Solovyov.

Not the last role is played by the fact that with the sale of part of the shares to Rostelecom, the state in his person will receive an asset in the form of a cellular operator, which is politically and practically necessary.

Earlier, VTB denied negotiating the sale of the Tele2 share and insisted that it did not plan to change its stake in the cellular operator.