Returns Topping 80% Spur Race for Phone Towers: Corporate Brazil
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The race to snap up phone towers being sold by companies from Oi SA to Telefonica Brasil SA is driving up prices, prompting some investors to hold off on signing new agreements.
Lured by gross profit margins of more than 80 percent to operate the towers, buyers have pushed prices up as much as 60 percent in the past year, to about $200,000 apiece, Wells Fargo & Co. analyst Jennifer Fritzsche said. With thousands of towers up for grabs, foreign and Brazilian private investors are going up against U.S. public companies such as American Tower Corp. and SBA Communications Corp.