OREANDA-NEWS. Portugal Telecom International Finance BV's five-year Credit Default Swaps (CDS) widened 44% over the past month to price at the widest levels observed since October 2013, according to Fitch Solutions in its latest case study.

The CDS widening for Portugal Telecom significantly outpaced the 6% widening observed for the overall European telecom sector over the same time period.

"Growing market concern for Portugal Telecom, which merged with Brazil's Oi SA last year, is likely stemming from uncertainty surrounding a potential USD8.7 billion sale of the company's assets to Altice SA," said Diana Allmendinger, Director, Fitch Solutions.

A shareholder vote on the sale was postponed until later this month amid discussions relating to the company's defaulted loans to Espirito Santo and questions pertaining to the validity of the Oi merger.

CDS liquidity for Portugal Telecom increased sharply late last month after dropping in the months prior. Currently, CDS on Portugal Telecom are trading in the third regional percentile (or with more liquidity than 97% of Fitch's European CDS pricing universe).

Fitch Solutions case studies build on data from its CDS Pricing Service and proprietary quantitative models, including CDS Implied Ratings. These credit risk indicators are designed to provide real-time, market-based views of creditworthiness. As such, they can and often do reflect more short term market views on factors such as currencies, seasonal market effects and short-term technical influences. This is in contrast to Fitch Ratings' Issuer Default Ratings (IDRs), which are based on forward-looking fundamental credit analysis over an extended period of time.