Govt to sell 3-5% stake in NTPC: Report

THE Centre will likely sell 3-5 percent stake in NTPC soon through the offer-for-sale (OFS) route to garner between Rs 3,500-6,000 crore. The roadshow for OFS was held on November 21-22 in Mumbai to gauge the investor appetite, an official said.
The share price of NTPC has been on the upswing for last few days partly due to its acquisition of the 720 MW Barauni Thermal Power Station from Bihar State Power Generation Company. On Tuesday, the NTPC stock closed at Rs 147.80 on the BSE, up 1.20% from the previous close.
NTPC, the largest thermal power producer in India and....
also a player in hydro power generation business, could also further boost the Centre’s disinvestment coffers this year by acquiring the government’s 63.79 percent stake in SJVN worth over Rs 7,000 crore.
The Centre’s holding in NTPC fell to 58.93 percent after disinvestment of 2.84 percent via further fund offer-3 of the CPSE ETF last month. In FY18, the government had mopped up Rs 9,269 crore by selling 6.75 percent via OFS in the state-run power producer.
The OFS route of disinvestment has taken a back seat this year as most PSU stocks are battered by market volatility. The NTPC OFS would be the second such sale this year after the Centre raised Rs 5,218 crore by selling a 3.19 percent stake in Coal India in November.
So far this year, the Centre has garnered about Rs 34,000 crore in disinvestment receipts, 75 percent of which via exchange-traded funds. While another Rs 17,000 crore worth transactions are expected by end-January, about Rs 15,000 crore is assured from the proposed Power Finance Corporation’s purchase of the Centre’s 52.63 percent stake in Rural Electrification Corporation after Cabinet accorded an in-principle nod to the deal recently. Of the transactions by January, the Centre could garner about Rs 12,000 crore from share buybacks by PSUs.
Achieving the FY19 target, which the Centre has said it would, this year would be a major feat for the government aiming to contain fiscal deficit at the budgeted level of 3.3 percent for FY19. Last year, the Centre’s disinvestment receipt was a record Rs 1 lakh crore, including Rs 36,915 crore from sale of its 51 percent stake in HPCL to ONGC.
NTPC, a Maharatna PSU under the administrative control of Ministry of Power, is India’s largest energy conglomerate with roots planted way back in 1975 to accelerate power development in the country. Since then it has established itself as the dominant power major with presence in the entire value chain of the power generation business. From fossil fuels it has forayed into generating electricity via hydro, nuclear and renewable energy sources. To strengthen its core business, the corporation has diversified into the fields of consultancy, power trading, training of power professionals, rural electrification, ash utilisation and coal mining as well. The total installed capacity of the company is 53,651 MW (including JVs) with 21 coal-based, seven gas- based stations, one Hydro-based station and one wind-based station. Nine Joint Venture stations are coal-based and 11 Solar PV projects. NTPC contributes 24 percent of total power generation due to its focus on high efficiency.