For Jet Airways India Ltd., it’s always only about one rupee.
As I wrote last month, the troubled full-service carrier needed to garner an additional 1 rupee (1.4 cents) per available seat kilometer to make up for its cost disadvantage against no-frills rivals. Cutthroat price competition denied it that opportunity, and now banks are picking up a majority stake – at a price of 1 rupee for 114 million shares.
The gamble, which seeks to avoid putting India’s oldest private airline into court-administered bankruptcy, will be put to a shareholder vote on Feb. 21.
Beyond that, the details of the rescue plan are fuzzy.
