A Franco-Nordic Telecom fusion?

France Télécom has announced its interest in a merger with Swedish-Finnish telecommunications firm TeliaSonera. Björn Sundell examines whether such a fusion would make sense: "One argument against a Franco-Nordic merger is that it wouldn't produce any synergy effects. The overlap is too small and there are too few possibilities for cutting costs. Moreover, France Télécom is still saddled with huge debts arising from its last shopping spree. This will make it difficult for the company to come up with the 30 billion euros it needs to purchase its stake. One alternative would be for the French to pay with their own shares, but why would the Swedish and Finnish states want to trade their shares in their local telecom companies for those of a state-controlled French company?"

» full article (external link, Swedish)
More from the press review on the subject » Corporations, » Economic Policy, » Financial Markets, » France, » Finland, » Sweden
All available articles from » Björn Sundell

» To the complete press review of Friday, April 18, 2008