Following market watch dog SEBI’s stipulation that all PSUs shall need to raise their public shareholding to at least 25 per cent in the next three years, 35 PSUs shall need to dilute stake worth Rs 61,282 crore based on June 18 closing price, according to Pranav Haldea, Managing Director of Prime Database.

“Coal India leads the list with a dilution of nearly Rs. 36,500 crore or nearly 59 per cent of the total amount. At present, the public holding in Coal India stands at 10.35 per cent. In terms of amount, this would be followed by NMDC, NHPC, NLC and SAIL,” said Prime Database in a press statement.

Several large and prominent PSUs such as HPCL (public holding of 48.89 per cent), BPCL (45.07 per cent), GAIL (42.49 per cent), PGCIL (42.10 per cent), MTNL (41.77 per cent), BHEL (36.94 per cent) and NTPC have already met the revised public shareholding requirement.

PSUs were initially asked to bring their public shareholding only to 10 per cent by August 2013 while the private sector companies had been asked to bring their shareholding up to 25 per cent by June 2013.

According to Prime Database, the total amount diluted by the government in PSUs to achieve minimum public shareholding norm since 1st April 2011 has been Rs. 2,510 crore of which Rs. 2,086 crore was through the Offer for Sale through Stock Exchange mechanism route and Rs. 424 crore through the Institutional Placement Programme route. Both these instruments were designed specifically by SEBI for promoters to divest their holdings to meet with the norms.

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