Bharti SBI in talks over Zain understanding appropriation

MUMBAI Wed Feb 24, 2010 3:24am EST Related News Bharti in talks over Zain deal funding - SBIWed, Feb 24 2010Bharti could line up Zain finance this wk-sourcesTue, Feb 23 2010Bharti lines up $9 billion in loans for Zain AfricaSun, Feb 21 2010Bharti lines up $9 bln loans for Zain Africa-paperSun, Feb 21 2010Zain, Bharti to sign letter of intent soon: reportSun, Feb 21 2010 Stocks & &

MUMBAI (Reuters) - India"s Bharti Airtel (BRTI.BO) has shown interest in obtaining funding from the country"s top lender, State Bank of India (SBI.BO), for its $9 billion offer to acquire Kuwaiti Telecom Zain"s (ZAIN.KW) African assets, the bank"s chairman said on Wednesday.

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SBI Chairman O.P. Bhatt told reporters Bharti was in talks with his bank regarding the deal, but gave no details. Bhatt was speaking on the sidelines of a banking technology summit.

"Bharti is interested," he said.

On Tuesday, people familiar with the deal told Reuters that Bharti might finalize by Friday what could be the largest acquisition loan for an Indian borrower.

Sources have said Bharti is looking at a mix of dollar and rupee funding to finance the deal. The majority of the deal"s funding is expected to be in the form of an offshore loan of at least $5 billion.

During its tie-up talks last year with South Africa"s MTN (MTNJ.J), Bharti had approached State Bank of India for dollar and rupee loans totaling about $2 billion, a government minister said in August.

(Reporting by Sumeet Chatterjee and Tamajit Pain; Editing by Tony Munroe)

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