Inwit takes centre stage with the Barclays promotion

(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) - A positive trading session for Inwit on the Milan Stock Exchange following a rating upgrade by Barclays. Analysts believe that the telecoms tower company, as well as its French rival Cellnex, have been penalised by a ‘perfect storm’ comprising sluggish investment by mobile operators, M&A in the European telecoms sector, uncertainties surrounding contract renewals and higher interest rates. “Share prices are factoring in a reduction of more than 25 per cent in contract renewals, an assumption that seems decidedly excessive to us,” reads the Barclays report. For this reason, “we are upgrading both companies to Overweight (Ow)”, with a target price of 38 euros for Cellnex (up from 33 euros) and 8.6 euros for Inwit. The latter target price remains unchanged, but at current levels, this implies potential upside of around 40 per cent, which is why the recommendation has been upgraded.

In essence, the analysts’ view is that the market is pricing in an overly pessimistic scenario regarding contract renewals. In particular, ‘over the last 18 months, Cellnex and Inwit shares have recorded a total shareholder return (TSR) of -12 per cent and -28 per cent respectively, compared with +32 per cent for the telecoms sector and a performance ranging from 0 per cent to -10 per cent for US TowerCos over the same period’. In the case of Inwit, it should be noted that the company highlighted a more challenging environment in March 2026, linked to its relationship with Tim and Fastweb and to the reduction in discretionary investment by tenants who have terminated their contracts. In France, too, the potential consolidation from four to three operators has created further pressure: the fear is that the operators resulting from the mergers will seek to achieve significant synergies on network costs.