RIL ends 4% lower post 43rd AGM; market-cap erodes by Rs 45,000 crore

Shares of Reliance Industries (RIL) settled 3.7 per cent per cent lower at Rs 1,846 levels on the BSE post the company's 43rd annual general meeting (AGM) on Wednesday, falling 9 per cent in intra-day trade on profit booking and on concerns of Saudi Aramco deal not fructifying. The stock of Mukesh Ambani-controlled RIL had hit a record high of Rs 1,978.50, up 3 per cent in early morning trade. It has more-than-doubled from its 52-week low of Rs 867.82 touched on March 23, 2020.

A sharp decline in stock price of RIL saw its market capitalisation (market-cap) erode Rs 45,000 crore (down Rs 69,000 crore in intra-day deals) in a single day to below Rs 12-trillion mark. TRACK THE STOCK MOVEMENT HERE

RIL chairman, Mukesh Ambani at the 43rd Annual General Meeting of RIL shareholders said Saudi Aramco deal has not progressed as expected due to disruption in energy markets. Ambani, in August 2019, had announced that RIL was in talks with Saudi Aramco for sale of 20 per cent stake in the oil to chemicals (O2C) business, which comprises of RIL's twin oil refineries at Jamnagar in Gujarat and petrochemical assets. The deal was to be concluded by March 2020, but was delayed.

“Due to unforeseen circumstances in the energy market and the Covid-19 situation, the deal has not progressed as per the original timeline. Our equity requirements have already been met,” RIL said in Chairman’s statement.

Nevertheless, we at Reliance value our over two-decade long relationship with Saudi Aramco and are committed to a long-term partnership. We will approach NCLT with our proposal to spin off our O2C business into a separate subsidiary to facilitate this partnership opportunity. We expect to complete this process by early 2021, it said. CLICK HERE FOR FULL STATEMENT

"Jio Mart is expected to be the next big trigger for RIL as it is built on a powerful tech platform and has the widespread network of Reliance Retail to expand on. The deal with Saudi-Aramco having been postponed due to unforeseen conditions comes in as a negative. The stock slipped towards the end of the AGM since most of the news was already priced in. It will see some correction to levels of Rs 1,750 in the short-term. However, the long-term growth trend is still intact," said Nirali Shah, senior research analyst, Samco Securities.

Meanwhile, RIL, Jio Platforms and Google LLC today announced the signing of binding agreements for an investment of Rs 33,737 crore by Google into Jio Platforms. This investment by Google values Jio Platforms at an equity value of Rs 4.36 trillion.

Google’s investment will translate into a 7.73 per cent equity stake in Jio Platforms on a fully diluted basis. With this, the total investment from financial and strategic investors into Jio Platforms stands at Rs 1.52 trillion, RIL said in exchange filing. The transaction is subject to regulatory and other applicable customary approvals, it said.