Saudi Telecom asks banks to extend payment deadline for Turk Telekom loan

Saudi Telecom Co. (STC) has asked banks to extend a payment deadline in debt talks related to Oger Telecom’s Turk Telekom, Reuters has reported, citing unnamed sources.

STC’s request was made on behalf of Dubai-based Oger Telecom, which missed its third consecutive repayment on a $4.75 billion loan. It also missed similar payments in September 2016 and March 2017.

The request is now under consideration by Oger’s creditors and the Turkish Treasury.

Turk Telekom is a Turkish fixed-line telecoms firm in which STC is interested in buying a stake.

Oger Telecom, which is 35 percent owned by Saudi Telecom, had secured a $4.75 billion syndicated loan in 2013 as part of a debt refinancing.

It struggled since then to make dollar-denominated loan payments after the lira’s slump cut the converted value of Turk Telekom’s local- currency dividends.

Last June, STC offered to reduce the loss banks will have to take on the outstanding loan after they previously rejected an earlier offer from the telecom operator in February because it involved a loss of more than $1 billion on the loan’s principal.