HDFC Bank stock jump 4%; zips past RIL to No 2 spot

HDFC Bank today surpassed RIL to become the country's second most valued firm after its shares jumped 4 per cent as hectic buying by overseas investors pushed their holding in it to the permissible limit soon after the opening of trade.
The company stock witnessed huge buying after the RBI restrictions placed on the purchase of shares of the company were withdrawn yesterday.
The stock jumped 3.75 per cent to end at Rs 1,377.15 on BSE. Intra-day, it surged 9.24 per cent to Rs 1,450 -- its 52-week high.
On NSE, it rose by 3.7 per cent to close at Rs 1,377.05.

Led by the sharp gain in the stock, HDFC Bank's market valuation surged Rs 13,126.93 crore to Rs 3,52,313.93 crore. It is about Rs 3,485.33 crore more than RIL's 3,48,828.60 crore mcap.
With this the bank became the second most valued Indian company after TCS that commands a market capitalisation of Rs 4,74,508.60 crore.

Shares of RIL too went up by 0.98 per cent to Rs 1,075.35 on BSE.
On the volume front, 55.25 lakh shares of the company were traded on BSE and over 10 crore shares changed hands at NSE during the day.
"HDFC Bank provided a flip to the index after RBI lifted the ban on FII investment. We continue to have a positive outlook on the bank but this price trend is likely to normalize given RBI re-imposing the ban after FII holding exceeded the threshold limit of 74 per cent on hefty buying today," said Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services Ltd.

The threshold limit for foreign holding had gone below the prescribed percentage yesterday enabling foreign investors to buy the stock.
"Today's rally was led by banking stocks, particularly backed by HDFC Bank. HDFC Bank stock rose by over 9 per cent in early trade after RBI removed restrictions imposed on Foreign investors' holdings," said Raghu Kumar, Director, Upstox, a leading online low-cost broking firm
HDFC Bank again reached the prescribed foreign investment limit for Indian companies, the Reserve Bank said today, just a day after such inflows had gone below the ceiling.
"The foreign shareholding by ADR/GDR/FIIs/FPIs/FDI/NRIs/ PIOs in HDFC Bank Ltd has crossed the overall limit of 74 per cent of its paid-up capital," RBI said in notification.

Therefore, no further purchases of shares of this company would be allowed through stock exchanges in India on behalf of Foreign institutional Investors (FIIs)/Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs)/ Non-Resident Indians (NRIs)/ Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs), RBI said.
RBI monitors the ceilings on FII/NRI/PIO investments in Indian companies on a daily basis and has fixed the cut-off points two percentage points below the actual ceiling.
For the quarter ended December 31, 2016, promoter shareholding in the bank was at 26.09 per cent, as per BSE data.