L&T Finance to raise Rs 500 cr

Kolkata, Feb 11:  L&T Finance Ltd, promoted by Larsen & Toubro Ltd and L&T Capital Holdings Ltd, today annouced the public issue of secured redeemable Non-Convertible Debentures (NCDs) aggregating to Rs 500 crore. Informing this to newspersons here, 'L&T Infrastructure Finance Co Ltd ' Chief Executive Suneet K Maheshwari said the public issue of the 2010 A Series debentures comprise 25 lakh NCDs with a face value of Rs 1,000 each. ''This aggregates to Rs 250 crore with an option to retain oversubscription up to Rs 250 crore for issuing additional NCDs. Putting these two together, we get Rs 500 crore in all,'' Mr Maheshwari added. The issue opened on February 9 and would close on February 22, he said adding this included various investment options and the yield on redemption was up to 8.58 per cent per annum. ''The company had so far raised this fiscal Rs 3,000 crore, including the previous public offer worth Rs 1,000 crore. Apart from the NCDs, the firm will raise another Rs 400-500 crore through various routes like bank loans and mutual funds,'' the Chief Executive said.  He also projected that the company's asset base would register 23 per cent rise at Rs 6,800 crore at this fiscal-end, as against Rs 5,500 crore during the past financial year. Around 62 per cent of L&T Finance's assets came from retail finance, while corporate finance contributed to the rest, signed off Mr Maheshwari.