Business News
Reliance hits forex debt market again with $800 million issue
The Mukesh Ambani-led RIL has been borrowing heavily for expansion and entry into telecom space with Reliance Jio into which it has invested over ₹1.4 trillion.
Reliance Industries, the most profitable company as also the largest borrower, has hit the overseas debt market with a $ 800-million bond sale programne as it seeks to pare a portion of its high cost debt that stands at over ₹ 2.14 trillion.
Meanwhile, rating agency Moody’s assingend a Baa2 rating to the proposed unsecured bond sale by RIL. The bonds will rank pari passu with RIL’s other existing and future unsecured and unsubordinated obligations, it said assigning the Baar rating.
It can be noted that for the September quarter, RIL, which has a market capitalisation of close to ₹ 6 trillion, had a cash pile of ₹77,014 crore and a debt of ₹2,14,145 crore, up from ₹ 1,96,601 crore in the previous quarter.
The Mukesh Ambani-led RIL has been borrowing heavily for expansion and entry into telecom space with Reliance Jio into which it has invested over ₹1.4 trillion. That apart it has also pumped in over ₹ 1 trillion into its core refining and petrochemicals expansion which is now completed.
Early in November, Moody’s had lowered RIL’s credit rating outlook to stable while affirmed its overall ratings, citing likely negative free cash flow due to heavy debt repayments over the next 18 months.
RIL would see large cash outflow over the next 18 months towards paying back its creditors for the billions of dollars of capex it had incurred on telecom and refining and petchem expansions. Moody’s had said.
“Accordingly, we’ve revised our outlook on RIL’s long-term issuer rating to stable from positive, but the outlook on its foreign currency senior unsecured rating is maintained at stable,” Moody’s had said.
Jio, which reported a ₹ 260 crore operational profit in Q2 with a ₹ 271 crore net loss, to turn in first set of profits in the current fiscal itself
The oil-to-telecom conglomerate reported a 12.5 % jump in Q2 net after refining margin soared to a nine-year high and telecom venture earned operational profit.
It earned a net income of ₹ 8,109 crore, or ₹ 13.7 per share as it could earn USD 12 on turning every barrel of crude oil into fuel, up from USD 10.1 a barrel gross refining margin in same quarter of previous year and $ 11.9 a barrel in first quarter of the current fiscal. Total revenue was up 23.9 % to ₹ 1,01,169 crore.
