In what could be music to the ears of investors, the Adani Group has repaid loans of $2.65 billion in the last few months to complete its prepayment programme. The idea was to cut leverage on a war footing, after the harsh allegations made by Hindenburg Research. This would release substantial shares pledged as collateral for such loans. In this endeavour, the investments that came in from GQG Partners were of great importance. This deleveraging should dispel any doubts that people have about liquidity position.
Even as global banks called off restructuring talks for Byju’s loans, the company has come up with plans for an IPO of its subsidiary, Aakash Educational Services (AESL). This will happen in mid-2024 and is likely to help Byju’s monetize one of its key assets. It is currently battling a deadline to pay $40 million interest on its $1.2 billion loan. It may be recollected that Byju’s has acquired Aakash in 2021 for a whopping $1 billion. Meanwhile, concerns are growing over Byju’s once again delaying results for fiscal year FY22 also.
It seems to be an unrelenting rally in defence stocks as HAL, Bharat Dynamics and BEL surged up to 4% on Monday. This rally was on the back of strong growth visibility. The rally came in the light of the sharply higher domestic procurements likely by the government for India’s armed forces. The government now plans to increase domestic procurement budget share to 75% in FY24 from 68% in FY23. Defence players in the private space and PSU space have been big beneficiaries, but most pure defence plays are PSUs.
IKIO Lighting, the LED lighting solution provider, mobilised Rs182 crore from anchor investors a day ahead of the IPO opening on 06th June 2023. As part of the anchor allocation, the company allocated a total of 63.84 lakh equity shares to 16 anchor investors at Rs285 per share, which is the upper end of the price band of the IPO. The total size of the anchor allocation is Rs182 crore, which is about 30% of the total issue size. Anchor allocation gets reduced from the QIB quota. Interest came from FPIs and mutual funds.
The monetisation of brownfield assets of PSUs has reportedly helped unlock capital worth Rs1.40 trillion in FY23. That is 44% higher on a yoy basis. The total monetization value stood at Rs97,000 crore in FY22. The brownfield monetization program includes assets like coal blocks, mineral assets, highway stretches and power transmission lines. Nearly half of the monetization happened in coal blocks. Monetization of road assets fell short of target by nearly 45% due to the INVIT tax proposed in the Union Budget 2023-24.
One97 Communications, the parent of Paytm, reported 118% growth in payment devices subscribed by its merchants for April and May combined. Its paid merchant subscribers comprising of soundbox and point-of-sale (POS) machines increased to 75 lakh during April and May. For Paytm, the model is largely a SAAS model where adoption of devices drives subscription revenues and higher payment volumes. Paytm had closed FY23 with 68 lakh merchants using its devices; representing yoy growth of 134% in tough times.
The DOT taskforce has recommended that the government provide incentives up to 75% for domestic design and manufacturing of telecom chipsets. This was after several big chip plans in India started to show signs of tiring. Under the current PLI scheme for chips, government offers fiscal support of 50% of the project cost. Chips or semiconductors are integral to a plethora of smart products from mobile phones and electronic products to white goods, gaming consoles and automobiles. That should turn the tables.
It looks like SKYMET had got its prediction of delayed monsoons bang on target. Apparently, the formation of cyclonic circulation in the Arabian Sea reduced cloud cover over Kerala coast. Hence the onset of rains in Kerala was likely to get delayed by another 2-3 days. According to IMD, the rains may be below average in June, but is expected to gather steam in July and August. However, delayed onset of rains tends to delay the planting of rice, cotton, corn, soybean, and sugar cane. Monsoons in India deliver 70% of water needs.