Telefonica, moving forward with a sale of stock in its infrastructure business as it seeks to pare debt, could do the same with its British wireless unit O2 this year if market conditions are favourable, chairman Jose Maria Alvarez-Pallete said.

Talks between Vodafone and Liberty Global about exchanging assets to better compete in Europe’s converging mobile, broadband, and TV markets collapsed yesterday because they could not agree on the value of their businesses.