Patrick Drahi’s group would like to recover new money to reduce its debt, estimated at 23.8 billion euros.
Altice is faced with the disproportionate weight of its borrowings, and the current economic situation is not reassuring the markets and investors.
A colossal debt weighing on SFR’s shoulders
Jewel of the group founded and chaired by Patrick Drahi, the operator SFR is going through a phase of turbulence. The company with the red square, which has recently been talked about for its support for Restos du Cœur, has indeed seen its number of subscribers drop, with 235,000 customers lost in nature.
In addition to these poor performances, where other mobile and fixed operators continue to recruit new subscribers, the company must bear a debt of 23.8 billion euros. To buy SFR in 2014, Altice had to borrow heavily from banks, and must now bring a lot of money into its coffers in order to support the various maturities that are coming. The recent rise in interest rates is not helping Altice’s business. According to The worldthe debt burden will increase by 80 million euros for the year 2023 alone.
The group’s debt reduction is therefore becoming a necessity, and Patrick Drahi announced during a meeting with investors that his company was going to sell part of the mobile operator.
Towards a concentration of the telecoms market in France?
It is not a question of the man selling SFR in its entirety, but a block, the size of which has not been specified. Patrick Drahi seems rather confident and believes that investors could quickly find interest in it. ” SFR is seen as the Eiffel Tower (brand, networks, organization, quality, etc.) and we will have many options “, he also confided during this meeting.
Investment funds, which know Altice and Patrick Drahi well, could be interested in the file. The telecoms sector is known to be a money-making business. One would think that the other French operators (Orange, Bouygues Telecom and Free) would also take a look at the file, but nothing is less certain. Despite several attempts to go from four to three operators, the operation has never been able to materialize, and the European regulatory authorities fear a price increase if this were the case.
The investment bank Lazard and BNP Paribas are currently commissioned by Altice to sound out possible investors, and it will still be necessary to wait several weeks to learn more about the amount recovered by the group at the end of this sale.
Source : The world
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