Business Line cited Mr Shakeel Ahmed CMD of Hindustan Copper as saying that Hindustan Copper's follow on public offer is likely in August. The Government which owns 99.59%, expects to divest 10% stake in the company through the offer. Mr Ahmed said that the company decided not to issue fresh equity as buoyancy in copper prices had helped to generate enough cash to fund expansion. Earlier, the company had planned to issue 10% fresh equity as part of the divestment process. He said that a Cabinet note has been moved in this regard and we hope to receive the approval some time in July. The disinvestment may happen as early as August. Stating that the current market price did not reflect the true value of the company because of a free float of only 0.4%, Mr Ahmed indicated that the follow on offer price should be lower than the market price to attract the investor interest. HCL is planning to expand its ore output to 12.4 million tonnes a year by 2017 from the current level of 3.4 million tonnes. The company plans to start eight new mining projects with an investment of INR 3,435 crore over the next 5 years. For the current year, the company has set a production target of 4 month of ore and 35,000 tonnes of metal in concentrate according to the memorandum with the Mines Ministry. Last year, it produced 3.47 million tonnes of ore and 31,378 tonnes of metal in concentrate. Mr Ahmed said that slowing economic growth may impact copper offtake in the current year. There’s some slowdown in the last two three months. We expect the consumption to grow at 5% to 7% against last year’s 8% estimating current year demand at six lakh tonnes.

Source