BCE buyers finalize funding

TORONTO (Reuters) - The buyers of telecoms company BCE Inc are sticking to the agreed C$42.75 per-share purchase price and have delivered the funding documents needed for the deal to go ahead, the company said on Friday.

BCE expects the deal, the world's largest leveraged buyout, to close by December 11.

The company, traditionally known as a dividend stock, said it will not pay dividends on its common shares before the C$34.8 billion deal closes. It will continue to pay dividends on its preferred shares.

BCE said on Monday it would not pay its second-quarter dividend as it works to complete the deal.

Montreal-based BCE is being bought by Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan, Providence Equity Partners Inc, Madison Dearborn Partners LLC, and Merrill Lynch Global Private Equity.

But since the deal was announced in June 2007, BCE shares have traded well below the proposed purchase price as investors fretted that the deal would be repriced or possibly scrapped, particularly after the credit crunch hit financial markets.

Financing to the buyers is being provided by Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland and TD Securities, a unit of Toronto-Dominion Bank.

"The signing of the financing and credit agreements and the resolution of issues involved in funding this transaction are the essential milestones to closing with both the purchaser and the lenders," BCE Chief Executive Michael Sabia said in a statement.

In a separate statement, Ontario Teachers' confirmed that funding has been secured.