Iran’s national carrier, TCI , has a new majority stakeholder following the country’s biggest ever stock market transaction, valued at $7.8 billion.
Etemade Mobin, a consortium of three privately-owned firms linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guard, purchased the 50% plus one share stake in the monopoly carrier over the weekend.
The acquisition effectively places control of the Iranian telecom sector under the control of the guard, an elite force which was created to defend Iran's clerical rule.
The Iranian government had been seeking to privatize the firm and landed the largest ever deal recorded on the Tehran stock exchange.
According to Iran’s Fourth Five-Year Economic Development Plan (2005-2010), the Privatization Organization of Iran affiliated to the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance is in charge of setting prices and ceding shares to the general public and on the stock market.
In 2007, Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei requested that government officials speed up implementation of the policies outlined in the amendment of Article 44, and move towards privatization.