180 companies have promoters' stake of over 75%

The government proposal to reduce the promoters' stake in listed companies to 75 per cent may result in 180 companies offloading part of their shares in the market, as per a study done by merchant bankers.

Leading merchant banker SMC Capital in a research study released here said there are 180 listed companies with promoters' stake of more than 75 per cent of which 28 are public sector units while 152 are non-PSUs.

"To comply with the proposal of reducing promoters' stake to 75 per cent, the total value of stake that needs to be offloaded is a whopping Rs 1,60,000 crore," SMC Capital said.

This is assuming the offloading takes place at the current market price of these shares.

Of this amount, PSU companies will need to offload shares worth Rs 1,38,000 crore and the remaining is by the non-PSU companies.

The government move to reduce the promoters' stake to 75 per cent is aimed at increasing the public float and better corporate governance standards. However, the market would find it difficult to absorb such heavy equity issuance and the proposal needs to be implemented in a phased manner, the study observed.