Malvinder Singh and Shivinder Singh, promoters of banking licence aspirant Religare Enterprises Ltd (REL), on Thursday divested 6.13 per cent shareholding in the diversified financial services major.

At Thursday’s closing price of Rs 353.50 a share of face value Rs 10, the stake sale in REL would be worth about Rs 315 crore, back-of-the-envelope calculations showed.

The move is part of the promoters’ announced plan to bring down their aggregate shareholding to 49 per cent in REL to meet the RBI guidelines for new banking licenses, which stipulate that a promoter group looking to set up a bank must do so through a non-operative financial holding company (NOFHC). Also, the public holding in such an NOFHC must be at least 51 per cent.

49% RBI norm

With REL being the designated NOFHC that has applied for a bank license, the promoters are required to scale down their earlier shareholding of 71.75 per cent to 49 per cent.

The process of REL promoters shedding their stake began in early September with Shivinder Singh selling 1.91 per cent shareholding to reduce his stake to 10.92 per cent.

Of the 6.13 per cent shareholding divested on Thursday, the US-based Customers’ Bank Inc (CUBI) has purchased 2.64 per cent stake. The balance, 3.49 per cent, has been bought by India Horizon Fund, a Religare spokesperson said.

India Horizon Fund Ltd, a pooled investment fund, had picked up 5.84 per cent stake in REL through market purchases on various days (between August 1 and September 6 this year).

In a deal announced in June this year between CUBI-REL-REL promoters, CUBI had decided to make a primary investment in REL. The US-based CUBI had also agreed to purchase the rupee equivalent of $22 million of REL shares from the promoters in a secondary transaction.

CUBI’s purchase transaction on Thursday is part of the earlier announced deal, it is learnt.

srivats.kr@thehindu.co.in

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