Amid a sharp rise in invocation of shares and equity dilution via QIPs, promoter stake in BSE-200 companies slipped to a four-quarter low of 57.30% in the September quarter.
Promoters’ stake has seen a steady fall in the last three quarters in the BSE-200 universe. In the June quarter, it stood at 57.99%, down from 58.15% and 58.40% in the March (2014) and December (2013) quarters, respectively.
While experts warn against reading too much into this ‘marginal fall’, Arun Kejriwal, director at KRIS Research, agrees that issuance of fresh capital through QIPs and invocation of shares in certain companies by lenders have led to the drop.
According to Capitaline data, the number of shares invoked in the September quarter stood at 3.08 crore, a 140% jump from the previous quarter.
Further, promoters continued to dilute their equity through qualified institutional placements (QIPs) with the amount raised through this route in CY14 amounting to R28,078 crore, the highest since 2009.
Among BSE-200 companies, Indiabulls Housing Finance saw promoter stake fall by 13.9 percentage points (ppt) in September quarter. For Indiabulls Real Estate, promoter stake fell from 48.9% in the June quarter to 37.7% in the September quarter, according to a Kotak Institutional Equities report.
Reliance Communications (-9.5 ppt), Aban Offshore (-8.4 ppt), Bhushan Steel (-8.1 ppt), GMR Infrastructure (-7.6 ppt), Info Edge (-5.7 ppt), Jaiprakash Associates (-5.5 ppt), Prestige Estate (-5 ppt), Bharti Infratel (-4.5 ppt), Central Bank of India (-4.4 ppt), Ashok Leyland (-3.5 ppt), Specialty Restaurants (-2.3 ppt) and SKS Microfinance (-1.2 ppt) have also seen a cut in promoter stake, according to Kotak.
While promoter holding has seen a drop in each of the last four quarters, FII stake in BSE-200 companies rose to 24.1% in the September quarter from 23.3% in the June quarter.
Within the BSE-200 universe, in the September quarter, FIIs raised their stake in United Spirits (12.7 ppt), Reliance Communications (10.6 ppt), Karur Vysya Bank (7.3 ppt), Bharti Infratel (6.4 ppt), Aban Offshore (5.9 ppt), GMR Infrastructure (4.6 ppt) and Ashok Leyland (4.4 ppt).
Data prior to December quarter has been excluded, as promoters had to reduce their stake by August, 2013, to meet Securities and Exchange Board of India’s (Sebi) minimum public shareholding norms.
