SBI sets to increase IPO up to an estimated $1.25 Billion

MUMBAI- SBI Cards and Payment Services, credit card subsidiary of State Bank of India and India’s top lender, submitted draft on Wednesday complete with proposed initial public offering (IPO) with market regulator and stock exchanges.

The company is set to release 5 billion worth of new shares as it also plans to offer up to 130.5 million shares open for purchase.  Details were disclosed in a prospectus released by the head managers of the deal.

However, IPO’s absolute amount was not disclosed and was viewed to range between 80 million rupees ($1.1 billion) and 90 billion rupees ($1.2 billion), as reported by local media. Such is one of the largest offers in India.

SBI Card, partly owned by SBI with 74% share and Carlyle Group with 26% share, tallied 196 billion rupees worth of assets at the end of March 2019.

The firm is considered as the second largest credit card server in India, with a total of 9.4 million outstanding cards recorded last September.

Kotak Mahindra Capital Company, Axis Capital, Bofa Securities, HSB, Nomura and SBI Capital Markets were the proponents of the IPO as stated in the submitted draft.

The firm has already finalized its insurance business as it prepares to sell investments in non-core assets to increase capital.