But while the financial institutions had hogged the limelight earlier, this time it was the turn of the private sector entities like Tata Iron and Steel Company, Larsen & Toubro and Arvind Mills.
However, according to reports, none of these issues have been able to garner sufficient interest either at the institutional or retail level.
The total mobilisation through public issues in September, when the major contribution was from debt issues, aggregated Rs 639 crore, much higher than Rs 348 crore in August. It was, however, lower than Rs 1,674 crore in July, Rs 684 crore in June and Rs 675 crore in May, though higher than Rs 383 crore in April. According to Prime Database, the response to the other issues of the month too has been extremely poor Of the issues which opened in the earlier half of September, fifteen have had to take their offer till the last closing dates.
Indicative of poor market sentiment is also the fact that only eight of the 87 issues were underwritten.
Given the poor market conditions, Prithvi Haldea of Prime Database is of the view that only the public sector is expected to dominate the immediate future with the Industrial Development Bank of India, the Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India and the Konkan Railway Corporation planning to hit the trail soon.
As far as mega premium equity issues are concerned, Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd has already pulled out its forthcoming Rs 450-crore offer and only Dena Bank's Rs 180-crore issue is likely to materialise in the near future.
Also under active consideration are Canara Bank and Bank of Baroda issues.
The only private sector mega public issues on the cards, according to Prime, are the ones from Amitabh Bachhan Corporation Ltd, DLF Power and Amer Ship Management.
The number of issues in the market in September was 87, and in August 86, compared with 99 in July and 127 in June.
There was a significant slowdown in the number of new issue documents being submitted for vetting to Sebi, according to the Prime Database report.
A total of 143 documents had been filed in February, which rose to 221 in March and 392 in April.
The figure, however, fell to only 90 in May, 51 in June, 49 in July, 51 in August and only 27 in September up to September 20.
