ICICI Bank to raise Rs 20,000cr - Video

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ICICI Bank, the country's second largest bank, will raise Rs 20,000 crore from sale of equity shares in the domestic and also American Depository
Receipts issue in June 2007. The follow-on offer would include the country's largest public issue of about Rs 15,000 crore.

The bank would also consider exercising a greenshoe option, which could almost the bank's net worth from Rs 24,313 crore as on March 31, 2007. The domestic and overseas issues would dilute paid up equity by about 20 per cent, based on the bank's shares of on the Bombay Stock Exchange. The bank's shares closed 3.2 per cent down at Rs 933.65 yesterday on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

Apart from the requirement to support credit growth, the bank's capital needs would be higher as the revised stringent capital norms, popularly
known as Basel II, come into force from this year.

"We have to look at India in the context of the existing investment pipeline of $500 million over the next three years. We would see doubling of infrastructure and manufacturing capacity and we have to prepare ourselves for the future," K V Kamath, MD & CEO, ICICI Bank, said.

The bank expects the capital proposed to be raised to support credit growth for the next three years. This is third capital raising by the bank since the erstwhile development finance institutions, ICICI, merged with ICICI Bank. In October 2005, the bank had raised over Rs 8,000 crore through a combination of domestic and American Depository Receipts (ADRs) issues.

"We will start the process for the equity issues from Monday and expect to hit the market sometime in June," Kamath told reporters.

The total foreign holding in the bank currently is 72%, 2% less than the ceiling of 74%.