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

To: md1derful who wrote (22449)	8/14/2001 5:26:47 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

Telemar says reaches peak of bad bills provison Reuters, 08/14/2001 15:45 SAO PAULO, Aug 14 (Reuters) - Brazil's biggest fixed-line telephone operator, Telemar (SAO:TNLP4)(NYSE:TNE), Tuesday said it believed it had reached the height of provisions for unpaid bills and the cost should fall going forward. Telemar's first half results Monday showed the firm spent 152 million reais ($60.8 million), or 4.6 percent of total revenue, to cover unpaid bills in the second quarter. Telemar said the cost, which rose as Latin America's biggest economy was hammered by an economic crisis in neighboring Argentina and electricity rationing at home, should start to come down with the firm's tougher bill policies. "We believe that the 4.6 (percent) is the worst point for us, but we cannot assure that of course," Telemar investor relations manager Roberto Terziani told a conference call with analysts. "The reason that we believe this is that our collection process was not fully effective until late May, beginning June." The recently implemented system would leave a voicemail message on the phone of a client 15 days after a non-payment of a bill. That would be followed 15 days later with personal contact with the client and a block on external calls. Incoming calls would be blocked if the bill had not been paid 60 days after the bill expired and the line would be canceled 30 days later if payment still had not been made. Analysts expected the firm, which operates across 16 states from the northern Amazon to Rio de Janeiro in the southeast, to take a hit from unpaid bill provisions in the quarter. Telemar stock, the heaviest weighted on Brazil's benchmark Bovespa (INDEX:$BVSP.X) stock index, was 0.8 percent lower by the middle of the second session. The Bovespa was 0.1 percent down at the time. saopaulo.newsroom@reuters.com)) Copyright 2001, Reuters News Service