SBI Capital Markets has recorded a jump of 63 per cent in net profit for the fiscal year 1997-98, despite subdued capital market conditions during the year.
The leading merchant banker registered a net profit of Rs 27.91 crore for fiscal 1997-98, as compared to a profit of Rs 17.08 crore last fiscal. The board has maintained a dividend of 25 per cent yesterday.
Gross income dropped slightly from Rs 141.44 crore to Rs 140.49 crore, while reserves went up from 190.65 crore to Rs 202.60 crore.
Due to depressed primary market conditions, the public issues accounted only 20 per cent of the domestic capital issues as against 53 per cent in the previous year.
SBI Capital Market has been ranked as the number one merchant banker by Prime Database for the total amount of debt raised through the private placement route.
It has also retained the number one position in the market in terms of amounts and number of issues raised by acting as lead managers to 10 issues raising Rs 2575.22 crore accounting to 89.3 per cent of the total amount raised by the public issues.
During the year, the company handled four rupee syndication assignments aggregating to Rs 620 crore and five foreign exchange syndication assignments aggregating US$ 50 million.
In the area of asset finance, SBI Caps sanctioned lease facilities to the extent of Rs 102.30 crore during the year.
The company handles three power projects of Essar Power- Hazira Project, GMR Vasavi Power Corporation and Nuclear Power Corporation in the infrastructure advisory segment.
It was also a co-lead manager in the GDR offering of MTNL whereby US$ 239.16 million was raised for the government of India as part of disinvestment and US$ 179.37 million for MTNL.
SBI Caps also rendered corporate advisory services for Cement Corporation of India (sale of unit), VSNL spin off of value added services) and Hindustan Zinc & RIICO (financial restructuring).
