RIL sells 4.01 per cent of RPL's equity for Rs.4,023 crore
24 Nov 2007
Mumbai: Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) has sold 18.04 crore equity shares, representing 4.01 per cent of the equity share capital of Reliance Petroleum Limited (RPL) out of its'' holding of 75 per cent.
Reliance Petroleum Limited (RPL) is a subsidiary of RIL, and is setting up a greenfield petroleum refinery and polypropylene plant in a Special Economic Zone at Jamnagar in Gujarat, which will have an annual crude processing capacity of 580,000 barrels per stream day (BPSD. RPL will rank as the sixth largest refinery in the world.
The aggregate sale consideration is Rs4,023 crore. Post the sale, RIL''s shareholding in RPL is 70.99 per cent.
RPL made an offering in May 2006 for 20 per cent of its equity, represented by 90 crore shares. This offering was the most successful IPO until then with overall demand exceeding $32 billion.
The sale of RPL shares was conducted by transactions through the stock exchanges, and has helped to further broad base the shareholding pattern of RPL.
The number of shareholders of RPL has increased from 12 lakh at the time of IPO, to 16 lakh.
According to a press release by the company, RPL''s performance as a stock on the NIFTY index this year has been very good, which at current prices would provide a return of 250 per cent to investors since the IPO.
According to the release, the sale of shares monetises only a very small portion of RIL''s holding in RPL.