Malaysia's TIME, DiGi shares fall on spectrum news

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 20 (Reuters) Shares in Malaysian broadband telecom TIME dotCom and mobile phone firm DiGi.Com fell on Tuesday after the government said it would withdraw some of the wireless broadband spectrum. On Monday, Communications Minister Lim Keng Yaik surprised the market by announcing the government would take back the 2.5 gigahertz (GHz) and 3.5 GHz broadband spectrum assigned to telecommunications firms to reduce the number of players.

Under an equity alliance unveiled last week, DiGi and TIME dotCom said they would look at offering WIMAX wireless broadband services using TIME dotCom's 2.5 GHz spectrum.

Shares in TIME dotCom sank to 0.87 ringgit, down 3.4 percent, in early trade. DiGi stock fell 2.9 percent to 25.25 ringgit.

REUTERS DKS RN0713