Institutional part greatly oversubscribed in NLC stake sale

The stake sale in state-run NLC India (NLCIL), formerly Neyveli Lignite Corp, got off to a good start with the offer of sale (OFS) portion reserved for institutional investors being massively oversubscribed on the first day on Wednesday, an official statement said.

Trading for the non-retail portion took place at a floor price of Rs 94 per share, a Finance Ministry statement here said.

"Against the offer size of 3.67 crore, bids were received for 11.63 crore shares, resulting in over subscription by 3.19 times," it said.

Thus the bids for the 11.63 crore shares are worth a little over Rs 1,000 crore.

"Government accordingly decided to retain the over-subscription by revising the total offer size from 3 per cent to 5 per cent of equity shares," the statement added.

At a floor price of Rs 94 a share, the sale of 5 per cent stake would fetch the government around Rs 800 crore.

Trading for the retail category will take place on Thursday, while retail investors would get a further discount of 3.5 per cent over the cut-off price for institutional investors, the government said.

After this disinvestment, government shareholding in NLCIL will come down to a little more than 84 per cent, the statement added.

Economic Affairs Secretary Subhash Garg announced here on Tuesday that the government had accomplished disinvestment worth Rs 30,000 crore during the current financial year and hopes to exceed the fiscal's divestment target of Rs 72,500 crore.

--IANS

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