BENGALURU: Bharti Airtel Ltd's shares fell 4.5 percent on Tuesday to a near eight-week low, after ratings agency Moody's Investors Service downgraded some notes of India's second-largest telecoms company by subscribers. Airtel, once seen as the bellwether of the domestic telecoms industry, posted a nearly 72 percent fall in quarterly profit last Thursday, suffering from continuing pricing pressure. The shake-up resulted in industry consolidation such as London-based Vodafone Plc merging its Indian operations with Idea Cellular in a deal worth $23 billion, making it the biggest telecoms company. Moody's downgraded the senior unsecured rating for Airtel and the backed senior unsecured notes issued by unit Bharti Airtel Int'l (Netherlands) B.V. to 'Ba1' from 'Baa3' on Tuesday. Concerns over Airtel also took a toll on the S&P BSE telecom index, which dropped as much as 3 percent.

Source: Mint February 05, 2019 06:00 UTC