Ruchi Soya board meeting to fix FPO issue price postponed to March 31

Ruchi Soya on Tuesday announced on Tuesday that the Board meeting to determine issue price, anchor investor issue price of FPO has been rescheduled to March 31.

“RUCHI SOYA INDUSTRIES LTD.has informed BSE that the meeting of the Board of Directors of the Company is scheduled on 31/03/2022 ,inter alia, to consider and approve Ruchi Soya Industries Limited had inform the exchange that the aforesaid board meeting proposed to be held on March 29, 2022 has been rescheduled and now it will be held on March 31, 2022 for the purposes of determining the Issue Price and the Anchor Investor Issue Price,” the company said in a stock exchange filing.

Shares of Ruchi Soya surged on Tuesday after the company, through newspaper advertisements, clarified that the SMSes pertaining to investments in its follow-on public offering (FPO) have not been issued by the company or its promoters.

The advertisements reportedly came after market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) directed the company to give the investors who participated in its Rs 4,300-crore follow-on public offering (FPO) the option to withdraw their bids due to “circulation of unsolicited SMSes advertising the issue”.

“There is a SMS/message in circulation in social media, speculating about investment opportunity in our Company’s Issue and about equity shares of our Company being available at discount to the market price (‘message’). We wish to bring to attention of the investors that this message has not been issued by our Company or any of our Directors, Promoters, Promoter Group or Group Companies,” Ruchi Soya said in a statement.

Besides, an FIR has been lodged to take up investigation against the circulation of unsolicited messages, the statement added.

On Tuesday, the shares of the company settled 15.2 per cent higher at Rs 938.

Capital markets regulator SEBI on Monday asked bankers of Baba Ramdev-led Patanjali group’s Ruchi Soya to give an option to investors in its ongoing follow-on public offer of shares to withdraw their bids while also cautioning them about “circulation of unsolicited SMS” about the share sale.

The development assumes significance as the share sale was already oversubscribed 3.6 times and withdrawal of bids can have a bearing on the final numbers.

This regulatory filing followed a direction issued by Sebi after a meeting held earlier on Monday with the bankers managing the Rs 4,300 crore FPO.

Sebi asked bankers to issue an advertisement in newspapers on Tuesday and Wednesday cautioning investors about the circulation of SMSs.

Besides, Sebi asked bankers to give an option to investors to withdraw their already placed bids till March 30th.

The issue opened on March 24 and the subscription level was 3.6 times at the close of the scheduled closing this evening.

The company has already raised Rs 1,290 crore from anchor investors.

Entire proceeds from the issue will be used for furthering the company’s business by repayment of certain outstanding loans, meeting its incremental working capital requirements and other general corporate purposes, the company said earlier.

Ruchi Soya’s Ruchi Gold brand is the market leader in branded palm oil and the company is also the pioneer of soya foods in India under the brand name Nutrela.

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