Rpl Meet To Fix Date For Warrant Conversion

The board of Reliance Petroleum Ltd will meet on Saturday (March 14) to fix the record date for exercising outstanding warrants.

In a notice sent to the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) yesterday, the board said that it will also consider providing a fresh conversion option relating to those triple option convertible debentures (TOCDs) which are not surrendered against the exercise of warrants.

The board will now consider the conversion ratio for such TOCDs, i.e., the number of shares into which each such TOCD may be converted.

According to the notice, in the terms of the prospectus, warrants issued by Reliance Petrochemic-als entitling each warrant-holder to an equity share of Rs 10 at Rs 20 per share, will cease to be tradable from April 10, 1998 and become due for exercise.

The triple option convertible debenture was made in 1993 initially, with the face value of Rs 60. These have now come down to Rs 40, with conversion taking place into 2 shares of Rs 10 each.

The three options provided were as follows: One was to sell the warrants to the markets and not subscribe to the shares.

The second option was not to sell the warrant and subscribe to the shares through cash payment of Rs 20 per share.

The third was to subscribe to the shares but not through cash and surrender the khokha portion of Rs 40 to be adjusted against warrants of Rs 20 each.

According to sources, in nearly 90 per cent of the cases, the debentures and warrants are held jointly.

In 10 per cent of the cases, the person either holds warrants or TOCDs.

The total warrants stood at 72 crore, with a total 24 lakh warrant holders.