Agencies
Spain’s telecommunications giant Telefonica announced on Saturday that it had replaced its CEO, in a surprise move prompted by pressure from major shareholders.
An emergency meeting of the company’s board elected Catalan businessperson Marc Murtra to replace Jose Maria Alvarez-Pallete, it said in a statement.
The company said the decision was taken "in view of Telefonica’s new shareholding structure and that some of its relevant shareholders have expressed the convenience of embarking on a new stage in the executive chairmanship.” The online newspaper El Confidencial first reported on Alvarez-Pallete’s likely departure on Saturday morning. Sources close to the operation confirmed it to Agence France-Presse (AFP) before the company issued an official statement.
El Pais reported that the SEPI state holding company, which recently took a 10% stake in Telefonica, had pushed for Alvarez-Pallete to be replaced by Murtra, currently head of the Spanish tech consulting group Indra.
Spanish media reports say Murtra is close to the center-left government of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
Alvarez-Pallete, who has headed Telefonica since April 2016, will receive a 23-million-euro ($23.7 million) severance package.
Telefonica, which has operations in nine Latin American countries, has been turbulent since Saudi group STC took a 9.9% stake in September 2023.
That led the Spanish state to re-enter the group’s capital through SEPI to defend its "strategic” role of providing services to the country’s armed forces.
Spanish banking group La Caixa also raised its stake to 9.9%.
Spain’s largest UGT union, one of the country’s largest, expressed concerns about the management change.