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Strategies & Market Trends : Telebras (TBH) & Brazil -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: wl9839 who wrote (21062)	6/20/2000 6:14:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 22640

Just saw this story Warren, doesn't sound great for TEF? What do you think this means?... Anatel said it will decided within the next 180 days how it will annul Telefonica's concession. Has TEF forfeited it's stake in CRT? FWIW, I picked up 500 shares of CUBE today. Will supplement with one position of options at some point. Semi-equip B2B out tonight and I expect it to be bullish as Semi-equips are one sector that tend to perform well in a rising interest rate environment. If it's not so good I pick up more CUBE tonorrow. MU reports Thursday I believe and MOT should be anytime, I'll have to check that one. Do you, the DOC or anyone have any cheaper, yet to be fully discovered semi's you've had your eyes on? I think CUBE is another nobrainer as they're in the hot and soon to be hotter DVD and set top box market. No one seems real sure how to value the company after the divicom spinoff, and are anxiously awaiting their first stand-alone earnings report in July. The Sansung win for CUBE the other day was big. Thanks, sf

To: wl9839 who wrote (21062)	6/21/2000 12:01:00 AM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

UPDATE 1-Brazil's Anatel steps into CRT after sale dispute Reuters, 06/20/2000 19:39 (Adds offer price in para 3, comments paras 5, 8, details 14-15) BRASILIA, June 20 (Reuters) - Spanish media giant Telefonica (MADRID:TEF) failed to agree on a sale price for its stake in one of its two Brazilian fixed-line operators, forcing regulators to seize control of the company, the government said on Tuesday. Brazil's telecom regulatory agency, Anatel, took operating control of CRT, a southern Brazilian phone company part-owned by Telefonica and a group led by Telecom Italia (MILAN:TIT), said Communications Minister Joao Pimenta da Veiga. The move came after Telefonica failed to agree on a price to sell its 32 percent stake in CRT to Brasil Telecom (SAO:TCSP4), a group formed by Telecom Italia and Brazilian financial group Opportunity. The companies said Tuesday they were discussing a price of between $610 and $850 million. Anatel's intervention could lead to all partners losing their stakes in CRT in return for compensation, unless a sale agreement is reached, the agency said. CRT, whose concession extends over 9.5 million people in Brazil's southernmost state of Rio Grande do Sul, could then be put back on the auction block. "The businessmen proved themselves to be incompetent in the negotiations," said Pimenta da Vega, after talks ran on beyond a deadline set for Monday and then extended to Tuesday. Anatel named Ronaldo Rangel de Alburquerque Sa, chairman of the board of Telebras, the country's former telephone monopoly, to take control of CRT. Rangel and the agency will take 180 days to investigate CRT's concession to see if the operators failed to comply with any part of their contract. That investigation will decide if the concession is to be withdrawn although Anatel will give back control if shareholders make peace. Rangel "has a clear mandate to identify the circumstances required to cancel the concession," Renato Guerreiro, Anatel's president, told reporters. Anatel can continue to hold control of CRT until April 2001. Brazilian regulators ordered Telefonica to sell its stake in CRT, or Companhia Riograndense de Telecomunicacoes, after it acquired Telesp (SAO:TLPP4), a land-line operator in the powerhouse of Sao Paulo state. Brazilian law bans one operator from holding two land-line companies. Brasil Telecom, however, is permitted to hold CRT as well as its own concession, which covers southwestern Brazil, since the government had planned to wrap those two concessions into one. The shareholders lose their control of the company starting Wednesday although they'd don't lose their equity stakes. The action doesn't effect minority shareholders, Guerreiro said. Telefonica bought control of CRT in 1998 although Brasil Telecom has been operating the company since February after the government ordered Telefonica to sell its share. Brasil Telecom, the country's third-largest land-line operator, already has a network that covers 30 percent of the country's land mass, where 17 percent of the population lives. Telefonica leads a consortia of companies that hold their own minority stakes in CRT. These companies include Spanish bank BBVA (MADRID:BBVA), Spanish electricity firm Iberdrola (MADRID:IBE) and Brazilian media company Rede Brasil Sul. Telefonica's stake gives it 85 percent of CRT's common voting shares. katherine.baldwin@reuters.com)) Copyright 2000, Reuters News Service