The arithmetic of Telecom Italia’s future is now distressingly simple for its shareholders. Either they tender their stock into Poste Italiane’s exchange offer by Friday, September 11, or they watch the window close on a deal that has already reshaped the stock’s trajectory over the past year. The offer, which has been open since July 20, combines a cash component of EUR 1.67 per share with 0.218 Poste shares for every TIM share tendered — a structure that has kept the equity trading in a tight band as the market waits to see whether enough investors bite.
What makes this final stretch so pivotal is the absence of updated acceptance data. Without fresh numbers on how many shares have been tendered in the last few trading sessions, investors are effectively flying blind into the deadline. The board of Telecom Italia gave its unanimous blessing to the terms on July 18, deeming them financially fair, but that endorsement has not translated into visible urgency in the market. The shares currently change hands at EUR 7.75, a whisker above the 50-day moving average of EUR 7.71, suggesting traders see little gap between the offer’s implied value and the prevailing price.
A Tale of Two Scenarios
The bull case rests on a familiar dynamic in takeover situations: the late surge. Shareholders who have been sitting on the fence frequently make their move in the final days of an offer period, and if that pattern holds here, Poste Italiane would secure the controlling stake it needs to push forward with its vision of a national digital infrastructure champion. The combined entity would boast revenues of roughly EUR 26.9 billion and employ more than 150,000 people, with cost synergies of around EUR 500 million dangled as the prize for successful integration.
Supporting that optimistic reading is the operational picture that emerged from the summer’s earnings release. The second quarter delivered group revenue of EUR 6.83 billion, up two percent on an organic basis, and — more significantly — a return to profitability with net income of EUR 88 million. That compares with a loss of EUR 8 million in the same period a year earlier and represents a sharp recovery from the EUR 292 million deficit recorded in the first quarter of this year. Adjusted for the MVNO component, revenue growth actually came in at 3.3 percent. The balance sheet tells a similarly orderly story: net financial debt stood at EUR 7.29 billion at the end of June, with leverage at 1.94 times.
The market has already rewarded this narrative generously. The stock has climbed 51 percent since the start of the year and sits 77 percent higher than it did twelve months ago. At its current level, the shares remain 86 percent above the 52-week low touched on September 4, 2025, though they trade about 5.4 percent beneath the yearly peak of EUR 8.19 set on July 3.
Should investors sell immediately? Or is it worth buying Telecom Italia?
The Skeptics’ Checklist
Yet the bear case is not difficult to construct, and it begins with insider behaviour. Regulatory filings show that Bonino Gigliola, a shareholder, sold 10,000 ordinary shares on Euronext Milan on August 17 at EUR 7.70 per share. Earlier, in late July, several executives — including Luciano Albanese, CEO of Telecom Italia Trust Technologies, and Michele Donati from the enterprise division — also trimmed their holdings. Some of those sales were tied to tax obligations arising from share-based compensation awards, which softens the signal, but the cumulative effect hardly radiates confidence in a substantially higher price.
The group’s financial record also carries blemishes that a purely operational view might overlook. The first half of the year still closed with a loss of EUR 204 million once discontinued operations are included, a reminder that the turnaround is not yet complete. Should Poste Italiane fail to secure its majority — or decide to extend, sweeten, or withdraw the offer altogether — the market would suddenly lose the central driver that has powered the stock’s remarkable run. The resulting vacuum would likely push the shares down as uncertainty reasserts itself.
What Happens Next
The coming days will determine which of these narratives prevails. If acceptance rates accelerate markedly, the market will read it as confirmation that retail and institutional holders alike view the terms as attractive, and the shares should settle near the offer’s implied value. If participation remains tepid, the focus will shift back to the underlying business — and here management has given investors something to hold onto. The company has reaffirmed its guidance for 2026 and 2027, calling for revenue growth of two to three percent and EBITDA expansion of five to six percent.
Until Friday, expect the trading range around EUR 7.71 to hold, with limited scope for decisive movement in either direction absent fresh data on the acceptance rate. The offer’s fate — and with it, the near-term direction of Telecom Italia’s share price — will be settled not by analyst commentary or market speculation, but by the quiet decisions of thousands of shareholders weighing a known bird in hand against the uncertain promise of the bush.
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