The Tata Group has increased its stake in three of its listed companies substantially during the past one year. These companies are Tata Steel, Tata Power and Tata Tea.
Incidentally, all the three companies have made waves during the past few months by announcing big-ticket acquisitions, either domestic or foreign.
According to the information gathered by FE, the Tatas had hiked their stake in Tata Tea from 26.88% to 35.4% between June 2006 and June 2007. This translates into an effective increase of 8.52%. Similarly, the group has hiked its stake in Tata Steel from 26.88% in June 2006 to 33.77% during the quarter ended June 2007, an increase of 6.89%.
On the same lines, the Tatas had hiked its stake in Tata Power from 32.28% in June 2006 to 35.64% in June 2007.
According to analysts with local brokerages, the Tata Group increasing its stake in its listed companies is in line with the group policy of consolidating business as well as unwinding the cross holdings in group companies.
Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata was on record saying that the group is on a consolidation mode and will completely do away with the cross holdings in a phased manner. It is also important that all the three companies from the Tata stable made significant acquisition recently, they pointed.
?This shows the aggressiveness and faith of Tatas in group companies,? an analyst at a local brokerage said.
