SBC, BellSouth Raising Scratch

SBC (SBC) and BellSouth (BLS) are looking to settle up the tab for Cingular's buyout of AT&T Wireless this week.

The $41 billion deal, which created the largest cell-phone service in the nation, gained final approval Tuesday, and now Cingular joint owners SBC and BellSouth are finishing the financing.

SBC says it will sell $5 billion in long-term debt to pay down about half of the $8.75 billion short-term loans and commercial paper debt the company took on to pay for its share of the deal, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission Friday.

Meanwhile, BellSouth said Friday it has closed the sale of five of its Latin American wireless holdings. Telefonica's (TEF) wireless unit, Telefonica Moviles(TEM), will pay BellSouth $2.3 billion for its stake in mobile-phone operations in Colombia, Nicaragua, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela.

BellSouth is selling its interest in a total of 10 Latin American countries. Earlier this month, BellSouth closed the sale of its investments in Ecuador, Guatemala and Panama. The sale of Argentina and Chile interests is awaiting government approval.

BellSouth expects to collect $4.9 billion from the sale of all 10 properties and says it plans to record an after-tax gain of $1.3 billion when all the transactions close, according to a SEC filing.

SBC shares rose 22 cents to $25.57 and BellSouth's stock added 16 cents to $26.74 in afternoon trading.

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