Telefónica SA is weighing whether to offer a vendor loan to the purchaser of its Mexico unit to get the deal across the finish line, people with knowledge of the discussions said. As part of wider talks, Telefónica and Melisa Acquisition are discussing the structure of the $450 million deal that was unveiled in April, including a potential financing component. The buyer, Melisa, is a consortium headed by Oxio Inc. alongside Newfoundland Capital Management, and it has agreed to purchase Telefónica Mexico.
The size of any possible loan is not clear. A Telefónica spokesperson declined to comment, and Oxio and Newfoundland did not respond to requests for comment.
Mexico's antitrust watchdog cleared the transaction in late September and permitted the parties as long as a year to complete closing. Telefónica has been in the Mexican market for over 25 years, yet gaining momentum proved difficult in a country where Carlos Slim's America Movil SAB holds the top spot. And the market is still reshuffling. Earlier this week, AT&T Inc reached a $2 billion agreement to sell its Mexico operations to a consortium comprising Grupo Televisa and Fintech Holdings.
Once a heavyweight across Spanish-speaking Latin America, Telefónica has been scaling back as it concentrates on Europe and Brazil, a shift overseen by Executive Chairman Marc Murtra. The company continues to hold assets in Mexico and Venezuela and intends to leave those markets too. A vendor loan would be an uncommon step for the company, which has divested assets in Argentina, Peru, Uruguay and three additional Latin American countries over the past two years.
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If seller financing helps clear this final hurdle, it could speed Telefónica's retreat from Mexico and simplify its portfolio. With regulatory approval already in hand and a one-year window to close, the path is laid out, and the AT&T move shows other multinationals are also rethinking their exposure. For anyone tracking telecom shakeups, the key theme is momentum toward consolidation and focus, even if the exact loan terms stay opaque for now.
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