Report: BT Mulls AT&T-Like Split
British Telecom
(BTY)
swiped a play from the
AT&T
playbook and, according to the
Wall Street Journal
and
TheStreet Recommends
The New York Times
, is undergoing a major restructuring.
The company plans to offer the public shares in its wireless unit, divide its telephony business into retail and infrastructure portions while possibly spinning off its Internet division. That's eerily reminiscent of the AT&T plan, which also takes its wireless unit public, albeit in a tracking stock for now, while cleaving its telephony business into two entities.
Both BT and AT&T are carrying huge amounts of debt. The
Journal
reports that BT's debt is expected to hit $50 billion next year, while AT&T's $62 billion debt load raised eyebrows at
Standard & Poor's
, the credit-rating agency, which cut its ratings on the company's debt.
