RIL hives off oil-to-chemicals business

MUMBAI: Reliance Industries (RIL) will transfer its oil-to-chemicals (O2C) operations to a wholly owned subsidiary for a $25-billion loan, besides $12-billion equity. Consideration for the transfer of the O2C assets, which includes the operating team and 12 manufacturing facilities, will be funded by a $25-billion loan from the parent, the company said in a presentation filed with the stock exchanges.
The interest-bearing loan from RIL to the O2C company will be an “efficient mechanism to upstream cash, including any potential capital receipts in the unit”, it said. Carving out the O2C operations into an independent entity will make it easier for RIL to bring in external investors. It had earlier explored a different structure, but India’s securities market rules did not permit such a scheme.
RIL had said earlier that it, being a listed company, cannot issue shares with differential rights (that is, equity shares with interest linked only to the O2C business) to investors. Therefore, the O2C undertaking has to be transferred into a wholly owned subsidiary of RIL, in which the external investors will invest, it had said.