Pantaloon to raise Rs 1,500 crore equity

Pantaloon Retail (India)’s board of directors approved a proposal to raise equity funds of up to Rs 1,500 crore. The board has told the company to restrict equity dilution to a maximum of 15%, and to limit its debt to equity ratio to 1.33 times. Pantaloon has postponed its annual general meeting from 22 October to 10 November, giving it time to seek permission for the equity issue from its shareholders in the AGM itself.

Sebi’s bar on IDR redemption irks Standard Chartered’s IDR-holders

Standard Chartered Plc’s Indian Depositary Receipt fell by as much as by 20% on Monday on the BSE, on news that capital market regulator Sebi will not allow redemption of IDRs, except if they were illiquid.

ICICI Bank raises $1 billion in foreign currency bonds

ICICI Bank has issued foreign currency notes with a face value of $1 billion or about Rs 4,500 crore. This has been sold through the bank’s Dubai branch. The five and a half year tenure bonds will carry a coupon rate of 4.75%. They were issued at a price of 99.665% of the face value, which translates to a spread of 251.5 basis points over the London Inter-bank Offered Rate (Libor).

SBI’s hikes base rate 75 bps, short term deposit rates to soar

State-owned banking giant State Bank of India yesterday announced a sharp hike in lending and fixed deposit rates effective May 12. Last week, the Reserve Bank of India acted to contain inflation, which stubbornly remained higher than its targeted range (even after being revised repeatedly). The central bank hiked the repo and reverse repo rates by 50 basis points and hiked the interest rates on savings bank balances to 4% from 3.5%.

Jaguar Land Rover to raise £1bn, shoulder Tata Motors’ debt burden

Tata Motors is raising £1 billion pounds or about Rs 7,300 crore by issuing bonds denominated in dollar and pound sterling, through its overseas subsidiaries under the Jaguar Land Rover umbrella. The money will be used to refinance existing debt and for general corporate purposes. The move comes at a time when JLR’s performance has steadily improved, with rising cash flows allowing it to service debt on its own.

IDFC allots Rs 757 crore tax-saving infrastructure bonds

Infrastructure Development Finance Company had sought to raise funds from investors for funding infrastructure projects through a second bonds issue. The government has permitted infrastructure finance companies to raise funds, from investors, for funding long term infrastructure projects. These bonds will be eligible for a tax exemption of Rs 20,000 from the taxable income, under section 80ccf of the Income Tax Act.
 

Reliance Mediaworks redeems Rs 130 crore FCCBs

Reliance Mediaworks, an entertainment and media company, announced the redemption of about €21 million or Rs 130 crore worth of foreign currency convertible bonds. It said that of the total FCCBs of €84 million issued in 2006, a total of about €63 million were converted into equity shares. The remaining debentures were redeemed on January 25, at a premium of 122%, that is it would have repaid a sum of about Rs 160 crore these debenture holders.

FDC to consider buyback of shares

Pharmaceutical company FDC’s board is considering a buyback of its shares. This will be its second attempt in recent times, after its previous one failed to get any shares. In December 2010, the company had announced the completion of the buyback of its shares, announced in Jan 2010. FDC is a mid-sized, Rs 660 crore company with products in niche segments such as ophthalmology and is famous for the Electral brand of oral rehydration salts.

Tata to up equity stake in Indian Hotels, invest up to Rs 840 crore

Indian Hotels has sought shareholder permission to issue 3.6 crore shares and 4.8 crore warrants, convertible into equity shares, to its promoters. This will be through a preferential allotment process and the price will be decided as per the Sebi (Issue of Capital and Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2009.
 

Indiabulls issues non-convertible debentures

Indiabulls Financial Services announced the closure of its qualified institutional placement issue on August 27. Contrary to news reports which pegged the amount raised at Rs 1,280 crore, the company raised an aggregate of Rs 650 crore through the issue of non-convertible debentures and Rs 13.8 crore as margin money on allotment of warrants, linked to the debenture issue.

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