HUDCO IPO subscribed over 80 times

Mumbai: The Rs 1,200-crore IPO for Housing and Urban Development Corp (HUDCO) got oversubscribed nearly 80 times on close on Thursday, helped by strong institutional and HNI interest. Over 20 lakh applicants bid in the HUDCO offer, which was more than nearly 19 lakh applications recorded in the Avenue Supermarts (D-Mart) IPO.

Merchant bankers said in terms of number of applications, the HUDCO offer is the most successful one in more than a decade. The record for the highest number of applications is still with the IPO for Reliance Petroleum in 2006, in which about 48 lakh investors had applied.

Through the HUDCO IPO, the government is divesting about 38.7 lakh shares, constituting 10.2% of its stake in the company. The shares were offered at a price band of Rs 56-60 each. Retail investors and employees are eligible for a Rs 2-per-share discount on the final offer price.

According to latest figures, the institutional part was subscribed nearly 56 times while the HNI part was subscribed more than 330 times, and the retail part was subscribed nearly 11 times. Given the overwhelming response to the offer, applications from retail investors were allowed to be accepted till 9.30pm, while for other categories it closed at 5pm, merchant bankers said.

The maiden public offer for HUDCO, which provides loans for housing and urban infrastructure projects in the country, is part of the government’s plan to even out its divestment programme over the whole year compared with bunching up of issues during the last few months of each fiscal. For fiscal 2018, it has set a divestment target of Rs 72,500 crore, of which Rs 46,500 crore is estimated to come through minority stake sales.

IDBI Capital Markets

,

ICICI Securities

,

Nomura Financial Advisory

and

SBI Capital Markets

are managing the IPO.