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

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 2:55:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 22640

Sorry David, I had to run out. Actually have the sun out here today...good day to run errands. I hear we have more snow coming in the next few days, with another storm Saturday I believe. I agree, my understanding is that all babies pay dividends. I'm curious if individually they pay more than the old TBR dividend, but not a real big deal for me. I was simply trying to understand the dividend per ADR and whether or not we would expect the other babies to make dividend announcements soon. I think I really confused this issue...sorry to mess up your lunch. The halt seemed quite unusual, but I see they have now opened it up and it's only down 1/4. I'm perusing for news now to see if it was something other than the dividend. I'm assuming the somewhat unexpected dividend news is responsible for lifting them all today, despite what appears to be lousy congressional news? sf

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 3:00:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

FWIW, my current concerns are actually as follows: 1) Congress getting their act together...any good news please! 2) Determining where the TNE auction stands 3) Locking in my understanding of the wireline mirror license sales 4) Determining when the January monetary meeting is (I thought I had read somewhere the end of the month) 5) Earnings dates on the Babies, in particular the wirelines, and UBB. I am going to give these issues an all out effort over the next 24 hours. sf

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 3:15:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 22640

Senate's new leader expects CPMF to be approved tomorrow Jan/05/99 at 01h22 pm ET Brasília, 5 - After meeting with the Senate's president, Antônio Carlos Magalhães, and the Defense minister, Élcio Álvares, the senator Romeu Tuma (PFL-São Paulo) announced he was indicated the new government leader in the Senate. Tuma also said that his name was suggested by minister Álvares, who left his post as the leader of the Senate himself to take charge of Brazil's Defense Ministry. Tuma further stated that he expected the approval in the Congress on the Temporary Financial Transactions Contribution (CPMF) hike -- considered a key measure to be incorporated in the government fiscal adjustment program (PEF) -- to occur by tomorrow. According to the new government leader in the Senate, the measure will be voted "in case there is enough quorum to get it passed through Congress". The minimum quorum in the Senate is formed by 81 senators. "If the government fails to reach the minimum quorum in the Senate tomorrow, we will concentrate all our efforts to approve the matter on Thursday," he informed. "The CPMF is the government's first priority." The Senate's president, also known as ACM, also agree with Álvares. ACM told reporters he would do all he can to vote the hike of the CPMF still tomorrow, and get it passed in the first-round of voting. According to him, if there is any problem, the matter "without any doubt" will be voted again next week. (By Nélson Breve)

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 3:21:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

David or anyone...I don't know if it's just me or maybe a full moon is right around the corner, but this seems to be the day of mass confusion. What is your interpretation of the previous article? Is it saying they now expect this tax to be approved in both the senate and Congress this week? Maybe the asprin's I took this morning had some kind of narcotic in them. Regardless, any kind of positive news on this tax could be great news. sf

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 3:24:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

Brazil Eliminates Splice From Bidding for Phone License, Approves BCE Brazil Eliminates Splice From Bidding for Telephone License Tue, 5 Jan 1999, 6:22pm EDT Brasilia, Brazil, Jan. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Brazil disqualified a group led by Splice do Brasil SA in bidding for a telephone operating license, leaving a group led by Canada's BCE Inc. and Qualcomm Inc. as the lone bidder in the country's largest fixed- line concession area. Brazil also cleared a group led by Sprint Corp. to bid for a license for long distance operations in the country. The winning bids are to be announced Jan. 15. Brazil's telecommunication agency, Anatel, said minority shareholders in the Splice group, which include Citigroup Inc., Previ, a Brazilian pension fund, and Portugal Telecom SA, couldn't bid because they hold stakes in other fixed line operators above the 5 percent allowed by the bidding rules. Splice's group was bidding for a license to operate in a region stretching from the country's Amazon region to Rio de Janeiro, with a population of 90 million people, three times as populous as Canada. The license is to provide phone service to compete with Tele Norte Leste, controlled by Brazil's Andrade Gutierrez group. The sale of the licenses is part of the country's efforts to introduce competition into Brazil's telephone market for the first time in more than two decades. Brazil opened its telephone market to investors in June 1997, when it started selling licenses for mobile telephone operations. Now it wants to introduce competition in the long-distance and fixed-line markets. Brazil also wants to raise money to close a widening budget deficit and boost telephone services in a country which has about 12 telephones per 100 inhabitants, one of the world's lowest telephone penetration. Brazil expects to raise almost $1 billion from the sales of licenses this month, down from estimates in August of as much as $6 billion. The large capital investments needed to build fixed-line and long distance phone service from scratch and the high cost of financing Brazilian investments may have discouraged some investors in the bidding, analysts said. Brazil said it received just two bids to provide fixed-line service in an area stretching from Rio de Janeiro to the Amazon, and one to provide long distance service. With the disqualification of Splice, there are just two bids for the two licenses, from BCE and Sprint. There were no bidders for two other fixed-line licenses for Sao Paulo and for southern Brazil. Sprint was joined in its bid by France Telecom SA and National Grid Plc of the U.K.. The companies are seeking a license to compete with Embratel, which is now owned by No. 2 U.S. long-distance carrier MCI WorldCom Inc. The companies who buy the licenses will compete with existing fixed line and long distance telephone operators which were sold to investors last July in the $19 billion sale of Telecomunicacoes Brasileiras SA, Brazil's national phone system. Splice, which holds two other mobile telephone operations in the country, said it will appeal the decision by Friday. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- © Copyright 1998, Bloomberg L.P. All Rights Reserved. latinvestor.com

To: David Petty who wrote (11189)	1/5/1999 3:30:00 PM
From: Steve Fancy	Respond to of 22640

One of my concerns down...Winning bids of mirror licenses to compete against TNE and EMT to be announced Jan 15, or US options expiration day. I assume before the end of the day. If we're lucky, we'll come in over the 1 billion they're looking for. Lack of interest in the other regions is somewhat surprising to me. Seems these licenses were expected to generate interest from some big players like AT&T. I further assume the last piece I read on the mirror licenses for the TSP and TCS regions was correct in stating they'll try again in March. sf