Astrazeneca delisting not illegal but immoral, says Tulsian

Shares in Astrazeneca Pharma India were locked in upper circuit on Monday after the drug maker announced a board meeting on Wednesday to discuss delisting proposal. The news has raised many an eyebrows in the analyst community, who feel the delisting is not being carried out in the right spirit. The Astrazeneca parent needs to acquire 15 percent to successfully carry out the delisting. It is likely to get this 15 percent from the 6 FIIs who had bought a 15.5 percent stake in the company via an open offer sale (OFS) last year. Interestingly, the 6 FIIs are P-note holders. This is likely to rob minority shareholders the chance of getting a premium for their shares from Astrazeneca. Long time market watcher, SP Tulsian wants SEBI to plug this loophole that promoters seem to be using quite a lot of these days. Tulsian recalls the case of another pharma company Fresenius Kabi.  "They (promoters) are parking all these shares in the so-called FIIs—in fact you can conveniently call them benami—and then they decide on the price and indicate the price. I have not seen (such a case) in my career, where the indicative price is the discovered price for delisting," he told CNBC-TV18's Anuj Singhal and Latha Venkatesh. He feels the indicative price will be close to Astrazeneca’s current market price of Rs 1200 odd a share. "If this delisting would had gone with the normal procedure as per the old rule, where the shares need to be collected from the public, then I think the discovered price would have been Rs 4,000," he said.(Posted by Sagar Salvi)