Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Tuesday, Apr 17, 2007
ePaper
Business Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Tuesday, Apr 17, 2007 ePaper |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Home Page
-
Petroleum Corporate - ESOPs Markets - Stocks
Jayanta Mallick
Kolkata April 16 After a few months, Reliance Industries on Monday regained the top slot in terms of capitalisation and pushed ONGC down to the second position. RIL's market capitalisation at the end of the Monday's session stood at Rs 2,03,400 crore, way above ONGC's Rs 1,92,500 crore. On the S&P CNX Nifty it earned the highest weighting of 9.8 per cent and the second slot on the BSE Sensex with 11.6 per cent weighting, next to Infosys. In fact, Reliance Industries had crossed the Rs 2-lakh-crore mark in market capitalisation in February this year. IT major Wipro and ONGC were the two other companies to have achieved this milestone. While Wipro crossed the Rs 2-lakh crore mark in 2000, ONGC achieved the feat last year. Since then, their capitalisation has fallen below the mark. According to Mr Arun Kejriwal, market analyst, the development in oil and gas exploration activity and better refining margins have of late been driving the stock. "The market players expect RIL to spring positive surprise in terms of exploration and Jamnagar refining activity," he added. The average crude procurement price for RIL - primarily Arab heavy crude - is understood to have been lower $4-5 per barrel than the mix of heavy and light crude basket relied on by other Indian refiners in the 4th quarter of 2006-07 at a time the global crude price ruled strong. The RIL's refinery technology allows cheap heavy crude as feedstock. "This alone should have a positive impact on the profits of the company. It is expected that RIL is likely to report an 8 per cent growth in the net profit year-on-year in 2006-07," said a sector analyst with an institutional brokerage. In fact, industry analysts said in the Q3 Reliance managed to extract much better refining margin than its PSU counterparts in the country as it could source crude at a much lower rate. At the current price of Rs 1,412, it is ruling at 19 times its FY2008 earnings. "There is still room for further upward movement," said Mr V. K. Sharma head of research at Anagram Stockbroking. The RIL counter today gained over 3 per cent. The traded quantity on the NSE was 17 lakh shares and on the BSE, it recorded a volume of 6.46 lakh shares.
Offers ESOPs
For the first time, RIL today floated its employees stock option scheme for a total of 2.87 crore options, exercisable into equal number of fully paid-up equity shares. The group's other petrochemicals company, IPCL, however, had issued sweat equity to its employees earlier through stock options. According to Mr V.K. Sharma, this move would also improve the sentiment for the stock. The vesting period for RIL stock options would range between one year and seven years from the date of the grant and the exercise period would extend up to five years from the date of vesting. The options would lapse if they are not vested within the specified period on account of not meeting the specified criteria, and if vested, but not exercised, within the exercise period.
More Stories on : Petroleum | ESOPs | Stocks | Reliance Industries Ltd
Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page
|
Stories in this Section |
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | The Hindu ePaper | Business Line | Business Line ePaper | Sportstar | Frontline | The Hindu eBooks | The Hindu Images | Home |
Copyright © 2007, The
Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu Business Line
|
