France Telecom Denies Wants To Buy Stake In Weather Holdings

LONDON -(Dow Jones)- France Telecom denied a report Thursday that it may bid for a stake in Weather Investments, the holding company that owns Italian telecommunications operator Wind.

Italy's Finanza & Mercati reported earlier Thursday that France Telecom may bid for a 20% stake in Weather Investments, citing no sources.

"We deny that FT wants to buy a stake in Weather Holdings," the FT spokesperson said.

A spokesperson for Weather Investments declined to comment.

The report said France Telecom's potential move comes at a time when talks between Weather Investments and private equity firms Blackstone, TPG and Permira over the acquisition of a 30% stake in the firm have run into difficulties.

Following the Finanza & Mercati report, the cost of insuring against a default in the debt of Wind fell sharply during early trade Thursday. Wind's five-year credit default swap tightened between 20-30 basis points to trade at 365 basis points, according to two London-based high-yield traders.

Wind's 9.75% euro-denominated bond gained a quarter of a point on the back of the report and was expected to bid at 110.25% of its face value, against 110% of face value Wednesday.

-By Kate Haywood and Geraldine Amiel, Dow Jones Newswires; +44 (0) 20 7842 9315; kate.haywood@dowjones.com

(Giada Zampano in Milan contributed to this report)

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

Posted to the site on 27th September 2007