After the sale of its Verizon stake (to Verizon) you might think Vodafone would be on a potential spending roll once it gets the cash in it coffers. Not a bit of it. According to Bloomberg, the group chief has said any serious offer for its current assets would be mulled over.

“If somebody comes and says ‘you have really beautiful assets’, then I will agree,” he said, although it’s not clear from that whether Colao was in a cheeky frame of mind or deadly serious.

“We have beautiful assets,” he said.

The group is in line for a US$130 billion payout from erstwhile partner Verizon Wireless for its share of the US wireless business and Colao is spending something like $11 billion on European network upgrades.

But the rumour mill has it that AT&T is preparing a serious take-over bid for the UK-based group. Reading between the lines it’s just possible that Colao is getting sick of anwering ‘that’ question and so says “maybe” instead, perhaps with a cheeky “assets” joke thrown in.