Mumbai: Two companies led by Anil Ambani feature in a list of publicly traded firms with over 95 per cent of their promoter shareholding pledged as of March 2019, says a report.
Zee Entertainment and Dish TV, the companies from the Subhash Chandra-led Essel group, have their promoter pledging 66.2 per cent and 94.6 per cent of the ownership pledged, respectively and lead the chart.
A report by brokerage Kotak Institutional Equities comes amid issues over the pledged shareholding of promoters after the NBFC crisis that began with the defaults of IL&FS last September, where massive share price erosions have led to a slew of unprecedented actions, including the financiers being dragged to courts for taking precautionary measures.
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Promoters typically raise money for their other businesses by pledging a part of their holdings in listed entities as security. The Anil Ambani-led Reliance group and Essel group have had the going tough.
The promoters have pledged 98.3 per cent of the holding in Reliance Infrastructure and 96.9 per cent in Reliance Capital, the report said.
The report, which is based on an analysis of top 500 listed firms on the BSE, said the percentage of pledged promoter holdings by value has come down in the March 2019 quarter in comparison to the preceding December quarter.
The percentage of pledged promoter holdings declined to 2.83 per cent in the March quarter from 2.98 per cent in the December 2018 quarter, it said.
Promoters pledged share outstanding stood at Rs 1.95 lakh crore, which is about 1.38 per cent of the market the capitalisation of the BSE-500 Index as of March, it said, adding of the top-500, promoters of 116 companies have pledged their shares.
The Ambani group entities Reliance Infra and Reliance Capital are among those where promoters have pledged over 95 per cent of their holdings, and have the company of CG Power and Industrial and Sterlite Technologies, it said.
Both the Ambani group entities also feature in the list of entities which saw the highest increase in pledged shares during the quarter and are joined by JK Tyre, Dish TV and VA Tech Wabag for company.
However, one Anil Ambani-led company, the bankrupt Reliance Communications has seen a decline in the quantum of shares pledged by the promoters during the quarter, the report said, adding Granules India, Strides Pharma, Coffee Day Enterprises and Bajaj Consumer Care also saw a dip.
From the companies that make the 50-share benchmark Nifty, Zee Entertainment leads with the highest pledge at 66.2 per cent, followed by Sajjan Jindal-led JSW Steel at 46.3 per cent and Gautam Adani-led Adani Ports & SEZ at 42.3 per cent, says the report.
