Zoom falling: has the video-call novelty worn off?

A takeover battle for BT would bring much-needed excitement to the City — as well as a major political row. The privatised telecoms giant that rarely pleases its customers and regulators has seen its shares fall by four-fifths since late 2015. While many other tech-related stocks have rebounded, BT’s price is still down where it was when the market plunged in February — lockdown having interfered with BT Openreach’s broadband installation programme, slashed new orders from business customers and even knocked out the fixtures that might have been shown on BT Sport’s television channels. On top of all that, there’s a gaping hole in the pension fund. No wonder BT’s board has asked Goldman Sachs and other advisers to dust off the company’s defence strategy in case a hostile bid is incoming.

But from whom? One contender is Deutsche Telekom, which already has a 12 per cent stake (acquired when it sold the EE mobile network to BT in 2015) and a seat on the board.