Hinduja Global Solutions Ltd has informed exchanges that its board will meet on January 14 to consider potential mergers, acquisitions and buyback of shares.
“The meeting of the Board of Directors of the Company will consider and approve to consider and explore: (i) potential merger and acquisition opportunities; and (ii) quantum/ timings of buyback of equity shares,” the company informed the exchanges.
The stock was trading 3.8 percent higher at Rs 2946.35 on the BSE on January 11.
Earlier on January 6, the company informed exchanges that its board had approved a dividend of Rs 150 a share after receiving a $1.09-billion after selling its healthcare operations. It also approved one-for-one bonus shares and approved raising the limit to extend loans, make investments and provide guarantees or security to Rs 3,500 crore.
This announcement attracted criticism from investors for a lower-than-expected dividend and the stock tanked 20 percent.
“What a miserable dividend by HGS. How can you sell cash cows and put money into other group companies and not give back to shareholders?” said Varinder Bansal, Founder of Omkara Capital.
“Balance sheet of a company can be studied, strength of promoters can be known. But one thing which is too difficult to study is the intention of the company’s promoters,” rued GK Agrawal, a Rajasthan-based trader, on Twitter.
Speaking to CNBC-TV18 recently, Partha Desarkar, Global CEO at Hinduja Global Solutions had argued that this was a special interim dividend that was being paid out to celebrate the value unlocking that has happened as a result of the sale of the healthcare business.
“Acquisition has been a part of our growth story for a long time and we are going to expand our footprint in the digital space especially in the digital customer management space. So we have been on the lookout for good buying in this segment and there are few where we are in active discussion for and will update this as soon as talks closed,” Desarkar had said.
As of March 2021, the firm has Rs 1903.22 crore of free reserves and securities premium account.
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