Piramal to pare Rs 1,000 crore of Lodha Developers debt in Q1FY20

Piramal Capital & Housing Finance is looking to reduce its Rs 1,000 crore of loan exposure to Lodha Developers in the first quarter of the financial year 2019-20 (Q1FY20).

“As part of our recent annual results, we had announced that we would look to systematically bring down our single borrower exposure to Lodha Developers. In line with that focus, Rs 1,000 crore will be reduced within this quarter itself,” a Piramal spokesperson said. “In addition, we have also received prepayments/repayments of Rs 200 crore YTD (year-to-date),” the spokesperson said.

Reports on Wednesday said Piramal is in talks with Goldman Sachs to sell Rs 2,000 crore worth of Lodha loans. However, the company spokesperson did not comment on the matter.

Piramal’s exposure to Lodha has come down from Rs 4,300 crore as of September-end 2018 to Rs 3,800 crore in December 2018, Khushru Jijina, managing director, Piramal Capital & Housing Finance, said in a recent conference call.

Piramal had a loan book of Rs 56,624 crore in FY19. However, the share of real estate loans in the book has come down from 83 per cent in FY15 to 63 per cent in FY19 as part of Piramal’s plans to diversify and de-risk its book.