RCom shares top trading volume, drop over 6% ahead of Q3 results

RCom shares topped the trading volumes on National Stock Exchange on Monday dropping over 6% ahead of the Q3 results due later today. Shares of Anil Ambani’s telecom company Reliance Communications shed 6.52% to hit the day’s low of Rs 26.5 on NSE. A heavy trading volume had been observed in the shares of Reliance Communications, as at 12:05 pm, more than 5 crore shares exchanged hands on both NSE and BSE with about 4.58 crore shares of NSE alone. The stock of RCom opened marginally high at Rs 28.75 up by 1.41% on NSE today. Within a couple of hours after market opening, at around 11 am, the stock of RCom plunged over 6% to hit the day’s low on both BSE and NSE.

Earlier in November last year, RCom posted a consolidated net loss of Rs 2,709 crore for the July-September period versus a profit of Rs 62 crore in the same quarter a year ago. The total revenue Reliance Communications halved for the quarter ended 30 September to Rs 2,667 crore as compared to Rs 5,142 crore in the July-September period of 2016-2017.

In a major development in December last year, RCom signed a definitive agreement with Reliance Jio for sale of towers, MCNs and fibre. The company will sell 4G services and 43,000 towers to Jio. The announcement comes just two days after Reliance Communications disclosed a new deal with the lenders under which nearly Rs 40,000 crore will be raised through the sale of assets, averting an imminent takeover by the 35 local and foreign banks. In the Reliance Communications presser held in late-December 2017, Anil Ambani said the company will exit the strategic debt restructuring plan with a zero write-off to lenders and bankers. Reliance Communications will be reducing its debt by monetising the assets of its wireless business and no part of the debt will be converted into equity under the new plan.

Meanwhile, India’s stock markets started on a positive note on Monday with key equity indices Sensex and Nifty making fresh all-time highs ahead of Indian Economic Survey 2018. Shares of HDFC, Maruti Suzuki, Reliance Industries, HDFC Bank, L&T, and TCS rallied the most providing a major uplift to the benchmark Sensex. With the commencement of Budget Session, Indian Economic Survey 2018, Union Budget 2018-2019, Q3 earnings of blue-chip companies such as HDFC, Indian Oil Corporation and ICICI Bank will likely to steer the domestic markets in the week ahead. Going further, PMI data for the manufacturing sector which is due on Thursday along with the first post-GST budget and the last full budget of the ruling NDA government before the general elections of 2019 will be closely watched by market participants.