Radhakishan Damani and associates offload India Cements shares for ₹1,889 crore

Radhakishnan Damani | At the top of the list is Radhakishan Damani, who is the man behind the supermarket chain D-Mart. The company, founded in 2000, enjoys a market capitalisation of over ₹2 lakh crore.

Billionaire investor Radhakishan Damani and his associates sold 23% equity in India Cements for ₹1,889 crore. The deal was executed at an average price of ₹267.74 per share on the BSE. The country’s leading cement maker UltraTech acquired the entire block, which is considered to be a bid to expand its presence in the southern market.

The deal will increase the penetration of UltraTech in the South Indian market, in which the cement maker has an 11% market share. Earlier this month, rival Adani group had strengthened its position in south India by acquiring Penna Cement.

While Radhakishan Damani sold 3.5 crore shares in the company, his brother Gopikishan Damani offloaded another 2.5 crore shares. Other sellers include Kiran Devi Damani, Shrikanta Devi Damani, Derive Investments and Derive Trading & Resorts Pvt Ltd.

Earlier in the day, UltraTech Cement in a regulatory filing said its board at a meeting held on Thursday approved making a financial investment to purchase up to 7.06 crores equity shares of India Cements. “This non-controlling financial investment constitutes around 23% of the equity share capital of India Cements,” UltraTech Cement said in an exchange filing.

UltraTech, the largest cement maker, has an annual capacity of 152.7 million tons and is targeting 200 million ton by 2028. On the other hand, rival Adani group has a capacity of 89 million tons and is targeting 140 million tons by the same year.

Damani — the retail tycoon and his family had been piling on shares of India Cements over the last few years. For instance Radhakishan Damani had raised his stake in the company to 4.7% during the December quarter of 2019 from 1.3% in the quarter-ended September.

Shares of India Cements climbed to their 52-week high of ₹299 on the BSE. In fact, the stock has been on fire, rallying close to 28% in just two days. The stock ended the day at ₹293.15 on the BSE, up 11.5%.