Solitary bid by IndianOil for HPL stake to be opened today
New Delhi   10-Oct-2013

The solitary bid by Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) for the 31% stake of Haldia Petrochemicals (HPL) that is on offer will be opened on Thursday and there is considerable speculation in corporate circles about the state-owned refiner's chances of succeeding.

Mamata Banerjee had been keen on Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) picking up the stake and the rounds of talks that the chief minister had with chairman Mukesh Ambani in Mumbai a few months back were believed to have covered this issue. However, RIL hasn't bid for the HPL stake as both state government and RIL officials confirmed to ET on Wednesday.

Cairn India of Vedanta Group, a Gail-Oil India consortium and ONGC had earlier decided to stay out of the HPL bidding process. IndianOil by default is the sole bidder and it's now for the state government to decide whether the bid will be accepted or not.

All figures are being kept under tight wraps and industry minister Partha Chatterjee told ET that he would comment only after the bids are opened and a decision taken. However, senior state government officials indicated that the reserve price is being kept at Rs 28.80 a share, which would imply that the 31% stake has a price tag of approximately Rs 1,500 crore. The officials said IndianOil has offered four sets of bids with varying clauses for 31, 19, 17 and 8 per share, respectively. IndianOil's highest bid would fetch Rs 1,614.48 crore at Rs 31 a share, while the lowest bid would fetch Rs 416.64 crore at Rs 8 a share. There was no official confirmation about these details from IndianOil.