The French conglomerate currently has majority control of ET, with the help of a 2% stake held by French bank Societe Generale. It has kept the structure like this to avoid consolidating ET’s debt in its own accounts.
If the deal goes through, Citigroup will aim to sell the unit to a trade buyer within the next two years. A likely bidder is Deutsche Telekom, which has a 49% stake in PTC and is trying to gain control of the unit from ET. The German firm is not a strong candidate to buy the stake at the moment because of its debt worries.
