Nalco share sale gets under way, stock slips

New Delhi: The PSU disinvestment for the current fiscal took off today, with 5 per cent stake sale in Nalco, which could fetch about Rs 640 crore to the exchequer.

Of its total holding of 74.58 per cent in Nalco, the government is selling 5 per cent or over 9.66 crore shares at a floor price of Rs 67. The floor price is at a discount of 8.78 per cent over the previous closing of Rs 73.45.

The offer for sale (OFS) would yield about Rs 640 crore. The two-day OFS began on bourses today with over 7.73 crore shares being sold to institutional investors. Over 1.93 crore have been reserved for retail investors who will also be offered additional discount over the issue price.

Retail investors are defined as individual ones who place bids for sales of total value of not more than Rs 2 lakh in aggregate. As of 1015 hours, as against 7.73 crore shares offered to institutional buyers, bids came in for over 9.40 lakh shares, as per data available on the NSE.

The share sale for today will continue till close of the market. In the secondary market, the Nalco scrip is trading at Rs 68.95, down 6.13?per cent, on the BSE. In the morning trade, the scrip had touched a low of Rs 68.30.

Nalco is the first disinvestment of the current fiscal, which began on April 1.
For this fiscal, the government has set a target of Rs 46,500 crore through minority stake sale and Rs 15,000 crore from strategic disinvestment. In 2016-17, the government had raised over Rs 46,247 crore from disinvestment.