3 companies to consider share buyback today; six cos get nod in a month

The board of directors of three companies, Aarti Drugs, SJVN and Unichem Laboratories will meet today to consider share buyback.

The board of directors of six companies – Orbit Exports, Pidilite Industries, eClerx Services, Aarti Industries, Lovable Lingerie and Gandhi Special Tubes – approved buyback plans aggregating nearly Rs 958 crore in the past one month.

Most of these companies announced buyback through the tender route, under which repurchases were executed using a fixed price tender offer. While a share buyback does not impact a company’s business, there is a financial impact to the extent that the cash and the number of shares in its books reduce. 

Since buyback reduces outstanding shares, it boosts EPS (earnings per share) and, therefore, the share price. In tender offer, the company makes an offer to buy a certain number of shares at a specific price directly from shareholders.

Buyback of equity shares by companies has hit a record high in the current financial year 2017-18 (FY18), with 32 companies acquiring shares worth Rs 486.39 billion till December 2017. In previous financial year 2016-17 (FY17), total 49 companies had acquired shares amounting to Rs 339.31 billion, the Prime Database shows.

Except Lovable Lingerie, the remaining eight stocks have outperformed the market by surging up to 42% after announcement of buyback plans. Gandhi Special Tubes soared 42%, while Aarti Industries and eClerx Services rallied 23% and 18%, respectively. Unichem Laboratories, SJVN, Aarti Drugs and Orbit Exports gained more than 5% each.

	Shares	Price	Latest	%
Name	in million	in Rs	price (Rs)	Chg*
Gandhi Special Tubes	0.9	500	439.45	42.2
Aarti Ind	0.8	1200	1162.10	22.5
eClerx Services	1.3	2000	1531.40	18.0
Aarti Drugs	NA	NA	740.00	16.0
SJVN	NA	NA	37.75	9.4
Unichem Lab	NA	NA	356.55	7.2
Orbit Exports	0.4	180	166.15	5.9
Pidilite Ind	5.0	1000	911.25	2.5
Lovable Lingerie	2.0	250	242.45	1.9
* over price one day prior to share buyback annoucement