Telkom plans to make capital market debut

JAKARTA (JP): PT Telkomunikasi Indonesia, the provider of domestic telephone services, is likely to make its capital market debut early next year, which would make it the second state-owned company to be listed on an overseas stock exchange after PT Indosat.

Minister of Tourism, Post and Telecommunications Joop Ave said here yesterday that the company's financial reports are now being edited by Arthur Anderson of the United States as part of the preparations to partially sell its shares on domestic and foreign stock exchanges.

"The public offering of the company's shares will be launched as soon as possible," he told newsmen after witnessing the signing of an agreement on the transfer of the "social mission" of Indosat to Perum Pos dan Giro, the state-owned postal firm.

Joop said that the Telkom's shares sold to the public will be made up of new and old shares, allowing the government to use part of the proceeds from the initial public offering (IPO) to finance the country's development programs.

"Just like Indosat, there will be also a divestment of the government's shares," he said of Telkom's IPO plan.

However, he declined to disclose the percentage of the company's shares that would be available to the public or on which stock exchange the company will be listed.

Decision

"That will be decided by the cabinet," he said, adding that his ministry, which has been appointed to handle Telkom's IPO, is also preparing the "beauty contest" of major securities companies bidding for the place of the international coordinator for the sales of the company's shares overseas.

Telkom, with around 45,000 employees, is one of the most major state-owned companies in the country.

Indosat raised US$799 million from the sales of its 25 percent of its 1.03 billion ordinary shares through the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in October and around Rp 650 billion ($297 million) from the sales of another 10 percent of the company's shares on the local market.

The shares sold through the NYSE were mainly government shares while those sold at home mostly consisted of new shares.

Merrill Lynch, the U.S.-based securities company, and PT Danareksa Securities, the state-owned securities firm, respectively, acted as global and domestic coordinators of Indosat's IPO.

Minister of Finance Mar'ie Muhammad said recently that the $799 million in funds raised from the sale of Indosat's shares on the NYSE were used to pay off part of the government's debt to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.(hen)