India draws a blank in DRs

During the period, 40 new public and private programmes were established from 21 countries. Telebras, the telecommunications company from Brazil, was the most actively traded depository receipt in terms of dollar volume and Ericsson was the most actively traded in terms of share volume. SAP, the German software enterprise, andAnglogold the South African Gold Mining company listed their ADRs on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).

On the other hand, India is yet to float an overseas offering in the current year. The depression in the domestic market and a host of problems related to the market and UTI have forced the government to defer overseas plans. The government last week decided against disinvesting Container Corporation of India (Concor) shares in the international market through a GDR issue. The Concor offering will be confined to a domestic issue.

Even the efforts of some private companies to list their shares abroad have not fructified so far. Infosys and Reliance have planned to float American Depository Receipts (ADRs) to list their shares on the NYSE. On the other hand, GDRs of Indian companies listed on overseas bourses are currently quoted at discounts ranging from 60-90 per cent to their offer prices.“In the third quarter of calender 1998, trading volume of depository receipts on US stock exchanges (ie NYSE,AMEX and NASDAQ) was 2.6 billion shares having a value of $ 102.30 billion,” Skindia said.