Egypt's Orascom Telecom said on Sunday its Pakistan unit had repurchased up to $140 million in senior notes at a 27 percent discount to face value. The unit, Pakistan Mobile Communications Limited (Mobilink), will spend around $100.6 million to buy back almost $138 million of senior notes due in 2013, OT said in a statement.
Mobilink will pay $730 per $1,000 of principal amount, on the 8.625 percent coupon debt. One analyst said the debt traded over the counter at a discount due to political risk in Pakistan and the poor performance of the unit. "We believe that buying back those debts is generally positive news for OT as the Pakistani subsidiary was already highly leveraged," said Marise Ananian, telecom analyst at EFG-Hermes.
In OT's full year results released in March, Mobilink lost ground in most key areas, including revenue, earnings, average revenue per user (ARPU) and number of subscribers. It also suffered from a sharp devaluation in the Pakistani rupee.
OT said it had received tender offers of more than $153 million. It had earlier offered to buy back up to $100 million with the aim of cutting debt and future interest costs.
The offer was conducted with Citigroup and Deutsche Bank as joint dealer managers and lead managers, and Standard Chartered as lead manager. Shares in Orascom Telecom were trading 5.69 percent higher at 35.11 Egyptian pounds ($6.24) by 0840 GMT.
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