Government OKs Telecom Argentina stake purchase

BUENOS AIRES, April 24 (Reuters) - Argentina has approved a local investment group's purchase of an extra 2 percent stake in the company that controls Telecom Argentina (TEC2.BA)(TEO.N), a group director said on Friday, dealing another setback to Italy's Telecom Italia SpA (TLIT.MI).

Argentine investment group Grupo Werthein now owns 50 percent of Sofora -- the company that controls Telecom Argentina, which is at the center of an antitrust investigation. Telecom Italia holds the remaining 50 percent.

Grupo Werthein, named after the Werthein family that runs it, bought the 2 percent stake in Sofora last year, but the purchase was only approved by Argentina's government this week, a Werthein spokesman said.

"We've had 50 percent since February 2008, but from an administrative perspective that could only be formalized when it was listed in the shareholder registry and that's what the Communications Secretariat authorized," Adrian Werthein, a member of the Werthein board, told Reuters.

No one was available at the secretariat to comment on the decision, which marks the latest chapter in a power struggle between the Wertheins and Telecom Italia over the Argentine phone company.

The approval comes as Argentine regulators investigate a possible telecommunications monopoly in the country because one of Telecom Italia's shareholders, Spain's Telefonica (TEF.MC), runs another local operator called Telefonica de Argentina (TEA2.BA).

Argentine regulators have frozen Telecom Italia's call option on Telecom Argentina as part of the antitrust probe and the country's center-left government named two officials to oversee the running of the company.

Earlier this month, Telecom Italia accused the antitrust commission of "trampling" on its property rights and taking actions that unfairly benefited the Werthein group.

Spain's Telefonica owns 42.3 percent of Telco, an Italian holding company that in turn owns 24.5 percent of Telecom Italia.

That means Telefonica holds an indirect stake in Telecom Argentina, in which Telecom Italia has a 50 percent stake. (Reporting by Karina Grazina; Writing by Helen Popper; editing by Gunna Dickson and Andre Grenon)