Shares of Bharti Airtel Ltd were trading flat in Tuesday's trade after the stock witnessed Rs 8,485 crore worth block deals earlier today. Indian Continent Investment Limited (ICIL), a promoter-group entity of Bharti Airtel, sold 0.84 per cent stake, or 5.11 crore shares, in the telecom operator today through a market transaction, for an aggregate amount of Rs 8,485.11 crore.
Bharti Airtel shares were trading 0.29 per cent lower at Rs 1,670.70. The stock has risen 4.74 per cent in 2025 so far against 3.37 per cent drop in the BSE Sensex.
Bharti Telecom Limited, the promoter of Airtel, anchored the trade by acquiring 1.20 crore shares, equaling 24 per cent of ICIL’s sale of today, helping the overall book to be allocated only to key marquee long only names, both global and domestic.
This transaction follows Bharti Telecom’s recent acquisition of an additional 1.2 per cent stake (7.31 crore shares) in Airtel from ICIL in November 2024.
"With this, Bharti Telecom now holds 40.47 per cent of Airtel, reinforcing its previously stated intent of strengthening its position as the principal vehicle to hold controlling stake in Airtel, remaining focused on gradually increasing its stake while maintaining a prudent leverage profile as it does so," Bharti Airtel said in a press release. Bharti Airtel recently reported a strong set of quarterly results, with a sequential increase in India Wireless revenue and Ebitda, driven by a residual flow-through of recent tariff hikes and 90 per cent incremental margin.
Its management expects capex to further unwind in FY26. Going ahead, the priorities for capex would be on investments in the transport layer, Home Broadband, data center and B2B. The management expects capex as a percentage of revenue to trend lower and soon be at par with global telecom operators.
"We continue to like Bharti's superior execution on the premiumization agenda. Further, with a moderation in capex intensity, Bharti is likely to generate significant FCF, which should lead to significant deleveraging and improvement in shareholder returns. We reiterate BUY on Bharti with our target of Rs 1,990," MOFSL said earlier this month.