{"id":161953,"date":"2017-03-05T08:51:37","date_gmt":"2017-03-05T06:51:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=161953"},"modified":"2017-03-05T09:01:47","modified_gmt":"2017-03-05T07:01:47","slug":"cheap-mtn-a-potential-takeover-target","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/161953\/cheap-mtn-a-potential-takeover-target\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Cheap&#8217; MTN a potential takeover target"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Sunday Times reported that investment bankers are looking at MTN as a potential takeover target.<\/p>\n<p>Citing a company insider, the report stated that MTN has attracted interest from investment bankers \u2013 but no firm offer was on the table.<\/p>\n<p>MTN\u2019s share price has plummeted from a high of over R260 a share in September 2014 to current levels of around R120 a share.<\/p>\n<p>This made the company cheap to investors, who, according to Ashburton Fund Manager Wayne McCurrie, can pick up MTN at between R150 and R160 a share.<\/p>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">MTN\u2019s troubles may be behind it<\/h3>\n<p>MTN has faced many challenges over the last two years, including a large regulatory fine in Nigeria, foreign exchange losses, and losing money because of poor investments.<\/p>\n<p>During this period, the company cleaned house. MTN\u2019s new CEO Rob Shuter will join the operator on 13 March, while new CFO Ralph Mupita will join the company in April.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.fin24.com\/Tech\/Companies\/mtn-cleans-house-20170303\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>MTN executive chairman Phuthuma Nhleko said<\/strong><\/a> the company has ensured\u00a0it will avoid a rerun of its Nigerian regulatory problems.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere is nothing \u2013 that we are aware of \u2013 that is a big regulatory issue,\u201d said Nhleko.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/business\/201080-mtn-wins-with-better-network-and-smartphone-sales.html\"><strong>In South Africa, the company has invested heavily<\/strong><\/a> in its network and is turning around its fortunes with subscriber and revenue growth.<\/p>\n<p>MTN\u2019s subscribers in South Africa now total 30.8 million, with increases driven by the prepaid segment \u2013 which\u00a0sits at 25.6 million.<\/p>\n<p>MTN SA\u2019s annual revenue totals R42 billion, fueled by an increase of 1.9% in service revenue and growth of 11.4% in data revenue.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/161507\/mtn-shares-advance-9-despite-reporting-first-ever-annual-loss\/\" target=\"_blank\">MTN shares advance 9% despite reporting first-ever annual loss<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Sunday Times reported that investment bankers are looking at MTN as a potential takeover target.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":70619,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[25,28],"class_list":["post-161953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-active","tag-mtn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161953"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":161965,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161953\/revisions\/161965"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}