Unless I'm wrong, which I frequently am, one of the following scenarios will play out for Telecom by the end of the year:
Tim Miles, latterly head of Vodafone New Zealand, now of Vodafone UK and tipped by The Wall Street Journal to be a possible successor to Theresa Gattung, becomes Telecom CEO. In keeping with Vodafone's global moves to gain landline access, Miles engineers a deal for his former employer to buy Telecom.
After all, 80% of the world -- and most of its phone makers -- have now gone GSM, and Telecom needs to follow at some point.
The Commerce Commission is kept at bay by a TelstraClear pledge to expand its wired and wireless business.
CEO contender Paul Reynolds, of British Telecom's unbundled wholesale unit, lands the top job and engineers a deal for his former employer to buy Telecom.
Some nameless shill from Telstra becomes the new CEO, moving swiftly to engineer a deal that for his former employer to buy Telecom.
Incumbent CFO Marko Bogoievski becomes CEO, and engineers a deal for his company's US technology partner, Sprint, to buy Telecom.
Incidentally, none of the above scenarios would not really constitute Telecom's ownership moving offshore, since a majority of its publically-traded shares are owned by Yanks and Aussies in our global village.
A private equity firm buys Telecom, scraps all its copper, then sends it to Halliburton to use in Iraq.
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