Last week, SEBI took certain decisions in the form of minor reforms to the securities markets, both primary and secondary. As part of a process that began nearly 3 years ago, SEBI has further liberalized the process for dilution of promoter shareholding in listed companies, since a deadline of June 2013 has been set to ensure minimum level of public shareholding in listed companies. This time...
Mandatory Offers and Creeping Acquisitions
The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) passed an order under the SEBI Takeover Regulations of 1997 (that existed prior to October 2011) in relation to the shares of Khaitan Electricals Limited (the Target Company). In this order, the SEBI whole time member directed the promoters of the company to make an open offer to the other shareholders on account of certain acquisitions of shares...
Should Government Companies Be Exempt From the Takeover Regulations?
Today’s Business Standard carries a report indicating that SEBI is in the process of considering a general exemption to the Government from making a mandatory open offer under SEBI’s Takeover Regulations 2011. This comes in the wake of two specific exemptions granted by SEBI this year in the case of IDBI Bank and IFCI whereby the Government was given special dispensation from making an open offer...
Interpreting the Takeover Regulations
With the current Takeover Regulations (that came into effect in October 2011) being fairly recent, they are being subjected to interpretation during the course of their functioning. SEBI this week issued two sets of informal guidance in the context of one takeover. The first pertains to whether an acquirer holding less than 25% can make a voluntary offer and then acquire shares in the market...
The Concept of Control under the Indian Competition Act: an analysis (Part II)
(This is a continuation of a post contributed by Avirup Bose) In an earlier post I discussed the importance of understanding the concept of ‘control’ while analyzing the probable anti-competitive effects of a merger especially in a partial stock ownership context. The discussion was in the background of an order of the CCI dated May 17, 2012, which basically held that if a company has a...
The Concept of Control under the Indian Competition Act: an analysis (Part I)
(The following post is contributed by Avirup Bose, who holds law degrees from the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences and the Harvard Law School and is qualified to practice law in India and the U.S. Avirup has worked in the New York office of Weil Gotshal & Manges and in the New Delhi office of S&R Associates. He has also briefly worked at the Mumbai office of Trilegal...
Convertible Instruments and “Control” Under the Competition Act
Earlier this week, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) passed an order involving a transaction between the Reliance Industries group and the TV18 group of companies. What otherwise appears to be a complex transaction can be described in a nutshell as follows. About 40% shares of Network18 and (indirectly) TV18, both of which are listed companies, are held by Mr. Raghav Bahl and his...
SEBI Reinforces the Sanctity of a Takeover Offer
In a recent order, SEBI refused permission for the withdrawal of a voluntary takeover offer by an acquirer. The details of the case involving an offer by Mr. Pramod Jain and Pranidhi Holdings Private Limited for shares in Golden Tobacco Limited are discussed at the Indian Legal Space Blog, as are reasons for SEBI’s decision. The following are some of the takeaways from SEBI’s order: 1. SEBI would...
Takeover Regulations: Pledge of Shares to Trustee Company
The SEBI Takeover Regulations (both the erstwhile regulations of 1997 and the present ones of 2011) carve out specific exemptions from disclosure and open offer requirements in case of pledge of shares in favour of banks or (public) financial institutions even if such pledge were to exceed the prescribed threshold shareholding percentages. Given the limited nature of these exceptions, one of the...
Further Order by SEBI on Shareholding Disclosures
(The following post is contributed by Yogesh Chande, an advocate practising in Mumbai) SEBI’s whole time member in an order dated 26 March 2012 (Order), has revoked the directions which were issued by an interim order dated 8 March 2010 (which has been discussed earlier) against the entities mentioned in paragraph 4 of the Order. One of the issues which required to be examined...
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