BCE: Freezing the puck

Shareholders of Canada’s largest telecom company, BCE, face a quandary. The company’s on the block. But how can it drum up an effective auction? There aren’t any domestic rivals who can afford the $40bn price tag. And Canada won’t let a foreign firm take control. That gives private equity free reign. But that’s not so easy.By law, BCE must be 53.4% Canadian-owned. Yet most of the world’s top private equity firms aren’t Canadian. Onex, the largest, has a $3.5 billion fund. The next 10 domestic fu...