Who sold NDTV shares to Adani at a discount to the market price?

There was always a mystery around the shareholders of New Delhi Television Ltd (NDTV) who tendered their shares in the open offer made by Adani Group in December as the offer price was pegged at Rs 294 even as the then prevailing market price was around Rs 400.

Why would any shareholder tender the shares at a lower price in an open offer when a much higher price was easily available in the open market?

Data from the shareholding details of the media company has now revealed that little-known corporate bodies that had bought shares of the listed entity in the last one year have most likely tendered their shares in the offer.

Incidentally, this has given rise to speculation in the market that such entities bought the shares with a specific intent to sell the shares to Adani Group as and when the open offer happened.

Little-known names such as Confirm Realbuild, Adesh Broking House, Grid Securities and Drolia Agencies that all featured in the shareholding data of NDTV at the end of the September quarter of FY23 have vanished in the December quarter.

Of these four entities, only Drolia Agencies and Adesh Broking House held shares of NDTV for one year while the other two entities were relatively newer entrants.

To be sure, the shareholding pattern discloses the names of only those shareholders that own more than 1 per cent stake in the company. So, it could be that these entities only partially diluted their stake.

However, the cumulative stake of such corporate bodies has almost halved from nearly 10 per cent in the September quarter to 5.30 per cent in December, which means that many sold their stake in the three-month period between October and December.

The open offer was launched last year on November 22 and closed on December 5 and a total of 5.33 million equity shares were tendered in the offer.

The cumulative number of shares held by the four entities -- Confirm Realbuild, Adesh Broking House, Grid Securities and Drolia Agencies – was nearly 4.6 million as of September 30, 2022.

Meanwhile, the cumulative stake held by foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) has also seen a significant dip with such investors holding a stake of 5.01 per cent as on December 31, 2022, much lower than the 14.72 per cent stake as on September 30, 2022.

The stake of LTS Investment Fund, which has a 1.69 per cent stake in Adani Enterprises as well, has dropped to 2.69 per cent in the December quarter from 9.75 per cent in the previous quarter. The stake of Vikasa India EIF I Fund has also more than halved from 4.42 per cent to 2.04 per cent.

In August last year, the Adani Group had acquired an indirect 29.18 per cent stake in NDTV — a company promoted by Prannoy Roy and Radhika Roy — by acquiring the shares of Vishvapradhan Commercial Private Limited (VCPL), which, in turn, held 99.5 per cent stake in RRPR Holding, a promoter group entity of NDTV.

Post the open offer, Adani Group, through its subsidiaries, holds around 37.5 per cent stake in the media company. Post the offer, Adani Group had also increased the offer price by Rs 48.65, bringing the final price to Rs 342.65.

Also read: Adani Power’s Rs 7,017-crore acquisition deadline of DB Power expires

Also read: Adani Ports, Adani Wilmar: 2 Adani group stocks to buy post selloff