An attractive option for Indian companies raising finances is to issue rupee-denominated bonds to persons residing outside India. Popularly known as “masala bonds”, some of these may even be listed on foreign stock exchanges. Naturally, the legal regime governing these bonds, particularly from the purview of corporate law, securities regulation and foreign exchange laws is of relevance. Over a...
Supersession of Bond Terms by State Legislation Disallowed
In Kalyan Janta Sahakari Bank v. State of Gujarat, a division bench of the Gujarat High Court was concerned with whether a legislation passed by the Gujarat State Legislature can unilaterally alter the terms of an issue of bonds by the government company to the detriment of the bond investors. The Court answered in the negative by striking down the legislation on grounds of lack of legislative...
India Plans to Tap into Green Bonds
[The following guest post is contributed by Arundhuthi Bose, who is an Executive at Vinod Kothari & Co.] Introduction Issuing bonds to raise funds from investors is not a novel concept. A bond, in common parlance, is an instrument evidencing indebtedness of the bond issuer to the bondholders. Here, a debt instrument is issued by the issuer to the investor, under which the issuer...
RBI Introduces Rupee-Denominated Bonds Regime
[The following guest post is contributed by Vinod Kothari of Vinod Kothari & Co.] Continuing with some other recent moves to liberalise the options of raising debt from external sector, the Reserve Bank of India (“RBI”) on 29 September, 2015 announced new guidelines (the “Guidelines”) for issuance of rupee-denominated bonds (“RDBs”) overseas. The Guidelines are much more...
Improving the Regulatory Framework Governing Masala Bonds
[The following post is contributed by Dhanush. M, a 5th year student at the Jindal Global Law School] “Masala bonds” refers to rupee denominated bonds issued in offshore capital markets which would be offered and settled in US dollars to raise Indian rupees from international investors for infrastructure financing in India. Masala bonds could prove to be a viable source of corporate finance as...
RBI Proposal on Rupee Linked Bonds
In the past, rupee denominated bond issuances have essentially been available to multilateral institutions, of which the International Finance Corporation (IFC) had availed of them. Now, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has announced a draft framework, which allows Indian companies as well to tap this avenue for raising debt. Indian corporates that are eligible to avail of external commercial...
Bonus Debentures: Features and Implications
[The following post is contributed by Prachi Narayan of Vinod Kothari & Company. She can be contacted at [email protected].] Introduction The reward of being a shareholder is singular: share in profits of the company. A few widely known forms of corporate rewards include cash dividends, bonus shares, preference shares, bonds, debentures, warrants and options, of which cash dividends and...
Indian Companies Issuing Securities Overseas
Historically, Indian companies have issued equity instruments in the form of depository receipts (either American depository receipts (ADRs) or global depository receipts (GDRs)) or convertible debt instruments in the form of foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCBs). Of late, such overseas securities issuances have reduced quite significantly. Now, the Government has revamped the legal regime...
Guest Post: The Changing Definition of Debentures
[The following post is contributed by Nidhi Bothra of Vinod Kothari & Co. She can be contacted at [email protected]] The new Companies Act, 2013 has changed the regulatory face of the corporate India; “raising the bar on Corporate Governance.” The new regulatory changes including need for CSR activities, increased investor protection, greater transparency in business and have been the...
Guest Post: Rights of MBS Bondholders Against the Company: Part 2
[The following post is contributed by Nidhi Bothra of Vinod Kothari & Company. The author may be contacted at [email protected] This is continuation of a previous post accessible here] Does a trust put complete cloak over the identity of beneficiaries? In the several rulings discussed in the preivous post, the privity of contract between the bondholders / debenture holders has been put...
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