Argentine investment firm IRSA Inversiones Y Representaciones SA (IRS, IRSA.BA) on Wednesday said it is one of the companies bidding to buy control of local telephone company Telecom Argentina SA (TEO, TECO2.BA) from Telecom Italia (TI).

The Argentine government has been pressuring Telecom Italia to sell its 50% stake in Sofora SA, a holding company which has a controlling stake in Telecom Argentina, for antitrust reasons.

Argentine conglomerate the Werthein Group owns the other half of Sofora. IRSA said the agreement includes an option to buy the Wertheim's stake in Sofora.

In a statement filed with the Buenos Aires stock exchnage, IRSA did not specify how much it had offered for the stake.

The government claims that the local telecommunications market became a monopoly after Spain's Telefonica SA (TEF, TEF.MC) bought a share in Telecom Italia in 2007. The two European companies each own the two largest Argentine telecom companies, Telefonica de Argentina and Telecom Argentina.

-By Shane Romig, Dow Jones Newswires; 54-11-4103-6738; shane.romig@dowjones.com
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