Thanks to Registrar of Companies'ignorance or indulgence, we have two scrips with the same name! In May 1995, an Ahmedabad-based company had gone public under the banner Global Securities Ltd. This share is listed on the Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Vadodara stock exchanges. In March this year, another Global Securities Ltd, based in Calcutta, went public. Fortunately, the latter one was proposed to be listed only on the Calcutta and Jaipur stock exchanges. Now, the Calcutta company is listed but, the scrip finds no quote after its initial listing price of Rs 10 on 9 May. The Global Securities duo offer a rare business opportunity to the arbitrage vultures preying and making a killing on the price differences prevailing on various stock exchanges. For the sake of argument, let us call the Ahmedabad GSL as GSL(A) and the Calcutta one as GSL(C).

Now, GSL(A)is currently quoting at Rs 15 on the BSE and GSL(C)has vanished after its maiden quote of Rs 10. Here, what prevents the unscrupulous `operators' from supplying the lowly quoted GSL(C) to the buyers of GSL(A)? Before the authorities could wake up, another scam would have scared away the dwindling investor species. Of course, who cares?

Even after 80 days of issue closing, the Hyderabad-based Rain Calcining Ltd (RCL) could not find a place in BSE's equity-price-list. On May 13, 1997, RCL's fully paid-up Rs 10 scrip opened its account at a measly premium of 25 paise with a volume of 400 shares witnessing two trades. On the next day, the Rs 110 crore-capital company again recorded a poor stock volume of just 100 shares with a solitary trade on the country's premier stock exchange. The scrip closed the day at Rs 9.50. On the third day, on May 15, the number of trades of the scrip picked up to 8 and its volume was 2500 shares. However, the price moved further southwards to Rs 9.25.

If one takes into account the first day trading of RCL's fully paid-up share, one will conclude that the company took as many as 81 days for listing as against the maximum allowable period of 77 days including the 7 grace days. Did RCL take a longer period than what is allowed? A close scrutiny reveals that RCL's Rs 5 paid-up-share was already listed on the BSE since 7 May and it was wrongly classified as `debenture' by BSE in its official quotation list. When this was pointed out to BSE by this columnist, BSE admitted its error. Here, what remains unanswered is the considerable fluctuation in the price of the partly paid-up shares of RCL.

Unlike RCL, another new entrant from Hyderabad, Bhagyanagar Castings Ltd (BCL) has opened its listing adequately rewarding its shareholders. The company is yet to report the commencement of commercial production which was scheduled to start in February 1997. Also, of a promoters' stake of 35 per cent, 8.5 per cent is free off any lock-in. Yet, BCL's share is slowly climbing up on the trading floor. The scrip, which opened at Rs 10.70 on May 9, has now reached Rs 12.25, yielding a capital appreciation of 22.5 per cent to the original investors. On the listing price, the appreciation works out to about 14.5 per cent. In the present depressed market, an appreciation of over 14 per cent in less than a week is indeed a great `bhagya' for the investors.

Pantex Geebee Fluid Power Ltd, the third Hyderabad company to get a quote this week has taken as many as 146 days after issue closing. The Rs 2.14 crore issue was lead-managed by the Mumbai-based SM Finance. It was offered to public on December 6, 1996. The share got its maiden as well as last quote at the issue price of Rs 10 on the Hyderabad stock exchange on May 12. Pantex is now in the long list of `no trading' candidates. The company had proposed to commission its new project for hydraulic pumps, actuators and accumulators by April 1997. The latest status is yet to be declared. What was glaring in Pantex was that its Hyderabad project had been appraised by the Mumbai-based Vatsa Corporation, formerly known as Vatsa Finance. Having such ill reputed appraisers, no wonder, the scrip has gone into oblivion immediately after making its bow.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.