Norway's Telenor is in preliminary talks to acquire the Swedish government's shares in TeliaSonera, according to the Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter (DN). DN says preliminary contact has taken place between Telenor, the Norwegian state (which owns a bit over 53 % of Telenor) and the Swedish government, which recently filed a bill to approve the sale of TeliaSonera and five other state-owned companies.
DN also claims that Russian financier Mihail Friedman, who holds interests in several Russian and East European telcos through the Altimo holding company, is also interested in the deal. Friedman could be willing to swap his shares in these companies for a slice of a new Nordic-Baltic-Russian telco group. However, both the Norwegians and Swedes are said to be cautious about dealing with the Russian magnate. TeliaSonera, as I have often written, is the half-mother of Latvia's Lattelecom and LMT, and holds controlling interests in Estonia's Elion and LMT as well as Teo and Omintel in Lithuania.
This is just a quick take on it, may write some more later.
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