SBI Cards Garners Nearly Rs 2,800 Crore From Anchor Investors Ahead Of IPO

Ahead of its initial public offering (IPO), SBI Cards and Payment Services (SBI Cards) has raised Rs 2,769 crore from 74 anchor investors. Anchor investors are institutional investors that are offered shares ahead of the IPO. SBI Cards IPO is scheduled to open on 2 March.

Singapore government, Monetary Authority of Singapore, Fidelity, Nomura, BNP Paribas, GMO, Blackrock and Kuwait government, are among the 74 anchor investors, who were allotted a total of 36.7 million shares at the IPO's upper price band of Rs 755 apiece.

Birla Mutual Fund and HDFC Mutual Fund were among the 12 mutual fund houses who were also allotted shares for 48 schemes.

SBI Cards IPO will be open from 2 to 5 March and is expected to raise Rs 9,000 crore. The total issue size of 13.71 crore equity shares will include a fresh issue of 66.22 lakh shares and 13.05 crore shares in offer-for-sale (OFS).

SBI (State Bank of India) currently holds 76 percent stake in SBI Cards, while the rest is held by Carlyle Group. According to its prospectus, the OFS will include up to 3.72 crore share-sale from SBI and up to 9.32 lakh shares on offer by Carlyle Group.

Analysts expect a good response from all categories for the issue.