London-listed natural resources major, Vedanta Resource Plc, has submitted its improved offer for buying out the government?s residual stake in Hindustan Zinc Ltd or HZL and Balco, sources said.
?We have submitted the improved bids last week and now it’s upto the government to come back to us,? said a person in the know of the development.
?For HZL, we have improved the bid by 15% from our earlier offer made in January 2012, while for Balco, we have?now offered $550 million.?
Vedanta, in January, had offered $2.938 billion or R15,493 crore and $338 million or R1,782 crore for buying the government?s remaining 29.5% in HZL and 49% in Balco, respectively. The government had not responded to the earlier offers, forcing Vedanta to seek shareholder approval for raising its bid.
The offer for the government’s remaining stake in HZL has been raised to $3.378 billion or R18,606.10 crore while for Balco the offer has gone up 62% to around $550 million or R3,028.78 crore. The Anil Agarwal promoted company got the shareholder nod for raising the bids at its annual general meeting held in London on Aug 29. Vedanta is being advised by JP Morgan Cazenove for the two transactions. The combined offer amounts to R21,634.88 crore and meets three fourth of the Indian government?s disinvestment target of R 30,000 crore for the 2012-13 fiscal.