Aries Agro surprises everyone

and ends the day at 251.60

Aries Agro settled at Rs 251.60 on BSE, a premium of 93.54% over the IPO price of Rs 130.

On BSE, 2.13 crore shares were traded in the scrip. The stock touched a high of Rs 261 and a low of Rs 150.

At the current price of Rs 251.60, the PE multiple works out to 37.55, based on the year ended EPS of Rs 6.7.

The stock had debuted at Rs 150, a premium of 15.38% over the IPO price.

The company had fixed the IPO price at the top end of the Rs 120 - Rs 130 price band. The Aries Agro IPO had closed on 19 December 2007 with 7.62 times subscription. The qualified institutional investors (QIB) portion was subscribed 0.88 times, the non-institutional investors segment 2.37 times and the retail portion 0.46 times.

Aries Agro is engaged in the manufacture of agricultural products. It operates in five categories that are multi-micro nutrient fertilizers, chelated micro nutrient fertilizers, specialty soluble fertilizers and anti-bacterial products for agricultural use and nutritional products for animals. Its manufacturing facilities are located at Bangalore, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata, with total production capacity of 21,600 tonnes per annum.

The comapny intends to set up new manufacturing units at Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Andhra Pradesh and an additional unit in Maharashtra. Aries Agro also proposes to enhance its equity holding to 75% in Golden Harvest Middle East (FZC), a company incorporated in UAE. The company also proposes to create mobile shops through mobile vans for which it is buying 100 trucks. This fleet would further increase market penetration in addition to the 65,000 dealers that the company already serves across 20 states in India.

Aries Agro reported profit after tax of Rs 8.69 crore on sales of Rs 72.66 crore in the year ended March 2007.