France yesterday launched the privatization of telecommunications operator France Telecom, with Economy and Finance Minister Nicolas Sarkozy announcing the sale of 9.6 percent of its shares.
The state is to retain 41.0 to 43.5 percent of the capital and plans to remain a major shareholder in the medium term, a finance ministry statement said.
France Telecom is a flagship industrial name in France and anything affecting its corporate status or the employment prospects of staff has provoked opposition from trade unions in the past.
The decision means that France Telecom will gain a more flexible capital structure and a larger investment base and that the government will earn funds needed to reduce its public debt.
Issued shortly before the company's board was to meet the statement said: "The state has today started the sale of 9.6 percent of the capital of France Telecom. When this sale is completed, depending on the number of shares that have been bought, the state will hold directly or indirectly between 41.0 and 43.5 percent of France Telecom's capital."
It added: "The state is determined to remain a major shareholder of France Telecom in the medium term."
The money raised will help France trim its public debt, which has repeatedly breached EU limits.
The government's stake sale is worth 4.6 billion to 5.8 billion euros (US$5.6 billion to US$7 billion) based on Tuesday's closing price, depending on the exact number of shares sold.
France Telecom, meanwhile, "needs to increase its room for manoeuvre in order to adapt to future developments in the telecommunications market," the ministry said.
By effectively privatizing the telecoms operator, the state plans to provide France Telecom with a more flexible capital structure and a larger investor base.
The government said France Telecom's stable financial situation and recent buyout of Orange and Wanadoo, its mobile and Internet access units, means the operator can now take full advantage of developments in the telecoms market.
Shares will subsequently be offered to existing and former France Telecom employees.
ACCOUNTABILITY: The incident, which occured at a Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Department Store in Taichung, was allegedly caused by a gas explosion on the 12th floor Shin Kong Group (新光集團) president Richard Wu (吳昕陽) yesterday said the company would take responsibility for an apparent gas explosion that resulted in four deaths and 26 injuries at Shin Kong Mitsukoshi Zhonggang Store in Taichung yesterday. The Taichung Fire Bureau at 11:33am yesterday received a report saying that people were injured after an explosion at the department store on Section 3 of Taiwan Boulevard in Taichung’s Situn District (西屯). It sent 56 ambulances and 136 paramedics to the site, with the people injured sent to Cheng Ching Hospital’s Chung Kang Branch, Wuri Lin Shin Hospital, Taichung Veterans General Hospital or Chung
‘TAIWAN-FRIENDLY’: The last time the Web site fact sheet removed the lines on the US not supporting Taiwanese independence was during the Biden administration in 2022 The US Department of State has removed a statement on its Web site that it does not support Taiwanese independence, among changes that the Taiwanese government praised yesterday as supporting Taiwan. The Taiwan-US relations fact sheet, produced by the department’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, previously stated that the US opposes “any unilateral changes to the status quo from either side; we do not support Taiwan independence; and we expect cross-strait differences to be resolved by peaceful means.” In the updated version published on Thursday, the line stating that the US does not support Taiwanese independence had been removed. The updated
‘CORRECT IDENTIFICATION’: Beginning in May, Taiwanese married to Japanese can register their home country as Taiwan in their spouse’s family record, ‘Nikkei Asia’ said The government yesterday thanked Japan for revising rules that would allow Taiwanese nationals married to Japanese citizens to list their home country as “Taiwan” in the official family record database. At present, Taiwanese have to select “China.” Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said the new rule, set to be implemented in May, would now “correctly” identify Taiwanese in Japan and help protect their rights, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. The statement was released after Nikkei Asia reported the new policy earlier yesterday. The name and nationality of a non-Japanese person marrying a Japanese national is added to the
There is no need for one country to control the semiconductor industry, which is complex and needs a division of labor, Taiwan’s top technology official said yesterday after US President Donald Trump criticized the nation’s chip dominance. Trump repeated claims on Thursday that Taiwan had taken the industry and he wanted it back in the US, saying he aimed to restore US chip manufacturing. National Science and Technology Council Minister Wu Cheng-wen (吳誠文) did not name Trump in a Facebook post, but referred to President William Lai’s (賴清德) comments on Friday that Taiwan would be a reliable partner in the
RSS