Last week's performances ranged from -12 percent to +18 percent, but the losers outnumbered the winners, causing our European telecoms index to drop 1.4 percent. The EuroStoxx 50 index gained 02. percent. Sweden was at the centre of attention with Telia and Tele2 reporting on Q2. Telia also announced two large acquisitions. Iliad proved successful in Italy. Most satellite stocks suffered a correction but Intelsat is still on top year to date.
Most satellite stocks retreated in week 29, worst of all SES (-12%) and Intelsat (-9.9%). Sky (-2.0%) will likely fall into the hands of Comcast, now that the latter withdrew from bidding for 21st Century Fox. The latter will become part of Walt Disney, which may decide to leave Sky to Comcast.
Russia's MegaFon (+18%) was among the biggest winners after announcing that it could delist its shares. Veon (+0.8%) started a restructuring.
Iliad (+6.2%) was up on news of reaching 1 million subscribers in Italy, after just 50 days of operation. And its owner Xavier Niël pushed his empire into a new country, acquiring MTN Cyprus via his Monaco Telecom holding.
Scandinavia
Tele2 (+18%) reported strong Q2 results, allowing its planned merger partner Com Hem (+14%) to benefit through the part shares-based offer that Tele2 made in January. Telia (-5.7%) also reported on Q2 and made significant moves into Norway and broadcasting. Telenor (-4.0%) was down on Telia fortifying its Norwegian activities and NextGenTel (-1.4%) wasn't able to benefit from the consolidation.
Spectrum
Italy's micro-cap Go Internet (+4.4%) rose on news of buying spectrum, as did Spanish small-cap MasMovil (-8.2%). Also, a 5G auction was started in Spain, which leaves Telefonica (-2.2%), Orange (-3.4%), Vodafone (-2.1%) as well as MasMovil bidding for the all important 3.5 GHz band.
