Bharti Airtel gains after tower unit files for IPO

Bharti Airtel rose 0.53% at Rs 255 at 15:19 IST on BSE after the company said its mobile tower unit, Bharti Infratel, filed a draft prospectus with Securities and Exchange Board of India today, 14 September 2012, for an initial public offering. The announcement was made during trading hours today, 14 September 2012. Meanwhile, the BSE Sensex was up 462.68 points, or 2.57%, to 18,483.84. On BSE, 4.71 lakh shares were traded in the counter as against an average daily volume of 6.35 lakh shares in the past one quarter. The stock hit a high of Rs 259.60 and a low of Rs 253.70 so far during the day. The stock had hit a 52-week high of Rs 412.25 on 16 November 2011. The stock had hit a 52-week low of Rs 238.50 on 30 August 2012. The stock had underperformed the market over the past one month till 13 September 2012, falling 2.42% compared with the Sensex's 2.20% rise. The scrip had also underperformed the market in past one quarter, sliding 17.55% as against Sensex's 6.76% rise. India's largest listed telecom operator by sales has an equity capital of Rs 1898.76 crore. Face value per share is Rs 5. Bharti Airtel announced that its subsidiary, Bharti Infratel, has filed its draft red herring prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) today, 14 September 2012, in relation to its initial public offer (IPO) of equity shares. The IPO constitutes a fresh issue of equity shares by Bharti Infratel and an offer for sale portion by Compassvale Investments, GS Strategic Investments, Anadale and Nomura Asia Investment (IB), Bharti Airtel said. In a separate statement to the stock exchange, Bharti Airtel, which owns about 86% of Bharti Infratel, said it had decided not to participate in the IPO. Bharti Infratel will reportedly raise Rs 5000 crore through the IPO. Bharti Infratel owns over 33,000 towers, across 18 states, and 11 telecom circles. Bharti Infratel also has a 42% stake in Indus towers, which was created as a joint venture between Bharti Infratel, Vodafone and Idea to hive off the towers business in 16 telecom circles. Bharti Airtel's consolidated net profit, as per international financial reporting standards, fell 37.3% to Rs 762.20 crore on 14% increase in net sales to Rs 19350.10 crore in Q1 June 2012 over Q1 June 2011. Bharti Airtel is a leading integrated telecommunications company with operations in 20 countries across Asia and Africa. Headquartered in New Delhi, India, the company ranks amongst the top 5 mobile service providers globally in terms of subscribers. In India, the company's product offerings include 2G, 3G and 4G services, fixed line, high speed broadband through DSL, IPTV, DTH, enterprise services including national & international long distance services to carriers. In the rest of the geographies, it offers 2G, 3G mobile services. Bharti Airtel had close to 261 million customers across its operations at the end of June 2012.