MUMBAI: Reliance Industries' (RIL's) nationwide 4G spectrum was a deciding factor in State Bank of India (SBI) agreeing to pick up a 30% stake in the payments bank that Mukesh Ambani's flagship company plans to launch. RIL is expected to roll out its 4G services under the name 'Jio' this year and has announced investments of over Rs 70,000 crore in the telecom business.

Explaining the rationale behind partnering the energy giant, SBI chairman Arundhati Bhattacharya said, "The payments bank has been brought out by RBI to improve financial inclusion and to ensure ease of small-value payments. This requires a strong technology platform as well as spectrum. RIL has a good pan-India spectrum. They also want to launch a 4G offering which is good for data."

India has for the first time managed to find a place among the top three countries generating most number of billionaires in the world with Reliance Industries’ Mukesh Ambani, heading the Hurun Global Rich List-India 2015 of wealthiest in the country.

The India list gives details of the richest people in the country with a cut off wealth of Rs 6,000 crore. Mukesh Ambani with a a wealth of Rs 1.2 lakh crore tops the list among billionaires in the country, followed by Dilip Shanghvi of Sun Pharma with an estimated wealth of Rs 1.02 lakh crore.

For a second time in less than two weeks, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) is planning to hit the overseas debt market. The company today announced that it will raise $ 750 mn through unsecured notes due 2045. The Notes have been priced at 262.5 basis points over the 30-year US Treasury Note, at a price of 98.865 to yield 4.948%.

The Notes will bear fixed interest of 4.875% p.a. with interest payable semi-annually in arrears and shall rank pari passu with all other unsecured and unsbordinated obligations of the company. The funds will be utilised for its ongoing capital expenditure, RIL said.

Some of India’s top business houses such as Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) and Aditya Birla Group are among about 100 entities that have applied for payment and small bank licences, the application deadline for which ended on Monday. Bharti Airtel was the first to announce plans for a payment bank licence, through an association with Kotak Mahindra Bank, on Thursday.

Reliance Industries (RIL) kicked off this year’s first benchmark issue of bonds on Thursday by raising $1 billion through a dollar bond issue. The funds would be used for its ongoing capital expenditure, RIL said in a statement.

Despite its rich cash pile (Rs 78,691 crore as of December 2014), RIL prefers to raise debt to finance its ventures. Its cash pile, however, is down from Rs 83,456 crore in December 2013. Between December 2013 and December 2014, RIL’s debt rose from Rs 1,42,084 crore to Rs 1,50,007 crore.

HONG KONG: Reliance Industries has announced an offering of 10-year 144A/Reg S bonds to yield around 265bp over US Treasuries.

The fixed rate senior unsecured US dollar benchmark bonds are expected to be rated on par with the issuer at Baa2 from Moody's and BBB+ from Standard & Poor's.

To take on its public sector peers in the fuel retailing segment, Mukesh Ambani-controlled Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) plans to leverage technology.

“We would go for an aggressive automation-based instant reward scheme, providing an edge over the competition, which lacks nationwide automation,” RIL said after its result announcement last week. This was to provide superior customer value across the network, it said.

The drop in crude oil and natural gas prices has led Reliance Industries' (RIL) three shale gas joint ventures (JVs) in America to pare operating and capital expenditure.

Shale gas, a business RIL expected would begin contributing significantly to its revenue by 2015, has been hit with a sharp downturn in commodity prices, especially in the case of crude oil.

Weighed down by a steep decline in global crude oil prices, which hurt the profitability of its core refining business, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) on Friday reported a 4.5 per cent drop in its consolidated net profit for the quarter ended December 2014.

In line with market expectations, net profit for the quarter was Rs 5,256 crore, compared with Rs 5,502 crore in the year-ago period. The company’s standalone net profit stood at Rs 5,085 crore, down 7.72 per cent and the first such drop in the past nine quarters.

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Friday allowed Mukesh Ambani's RIL six weeks' time to respond to the CAG report on gas pricing from the KG basin.

The SC also allowed petitioners, including CPI leader Gurudas Dasgupta, to file response on government's new guidelines on gas pricing.

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