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Infosys co-founders and their families partially offloaded their stakes in the second-ranked Indian IT services firm, but were forced to come out with statements expressing confidence in the company’s leadership after shares fell 5 per cent.
The co-founders — NR Narayana Murthy, Nandan Nilekani, and Krishnaswamy Dinesh— their families, and the wife of SD Shibulal (co-founder and former CEO) Kumari Shibulal totally sold 3.26 crore shares for ₹6,484 crore ($1.1 billion).
Incidentally, Infosys shareholders received bonus shares on December 4, in the ratio of 1:1 (one share for every share held in the company). News of the stake sale, which came months after the company named Vishal Sikka as its CEO, created a flutter in the market. It dragged the Sensex down 1.2 per cent to 28,119 as Infosys shares fell 4.88 per cent to ₹1,968.60.
The shares were picked up by about 40-50 foreign as well as domestic institutional investors, Sanjay Sharma, Managing Director, Equity Capital Markets of Deutsche Equities, told BusinessLine .
The shares were sold at an average price of ₹1,988.87, 4 per cent lower than the Friday’s closing price. The founders—including S. Gopalakrishnan, NS Raghavan and Ashok Arora— and their families held a total 15.92 per cent stake in the company before Monday’s sale. It is unlikely that there will be another round of stake sale by the co-founders anytime soon, sources close to the promoters said. While there was enough speculation regarding the sale—especially with the co-founders asking the board to consider them as investors and not promoters in October—Narayana Murthy tried to put the rumours to rest through a statement. He said the founders continue to have tremendous confidence in the future of Infosys and its leaders. “Even after this sale, our family continues to be the largest shareholder among retail shareholders. Our family has sold a minor part of our stake to continue various activities, including our efforts to encourage entrepreneurship and our personal philanthropic efforts,” Murthy said.
Nilekani told this newspaper that he and his family sold a part of their stake for personal reasons and to continue their philanthropic efforts. An analyst with Angel Broking, Sarabjit Nangra, said there was no need to read too much into the action by the co-founders. “They have made it clear that they want to use the funds for philanthropy.”
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