The country had exported 8.242 MT finished steel during 2016-17 fiscal, the Joint Plant Committee (JPC) said in a report.PTI  |  May 06, 2018, 13:40 IST

Empowered by Ministry of Steel, JPC is the only institution which collects data on the Indian iron and steel industry.

New Delhi: India's total export of finished steel increased by 16.7 per cent to 9.621 million tonnes (MT) in 2017-18, according to an official data. 

The country had exported 8.242 MT finished steel during 2016-17 fiscal, the Joint Plant Committee (JPC) said in a report. 

"Export of total finished steel was up by 16.7 per cent in April-March 2017-18 at 9.621 MT over same period of last year, in which contribution of the non-alloy steel segment stood at 8.727 MT, while the rest was the contribution of the alloy steel segment including stainless steel," the JPC report said. 

Empowered by Ministry of Steel, JPC is the only institution which collects data on the Indian iron and steel industry. 

In March 2018, the overall export fell sharply by 56.3 per cent to 0.708 MT from 1.621 MT during the same month a year ago. 

The import has also registered a rise during the last fiscal, the figures show. 

Import of total finished steel rose by 3.5 per cent to 7.482 MT in FY18 compared to 7.226 MT in the preceding fiscal. 

However, the overall import during March fell by 19.7 per cent to 0.482 MT as against 0.600 MT during the same month in 2017. 

"Import of total finished steel was at 7.482 mt in April-March 2017-18, up by 3.5 per cent over same period of last year, in which contribution of the non-alloy steel segment stood at 5.636 MT, while the rest was the contribution of the alloy steel segment, including stainless steel," the JPC said. 

India's total production of finished steel during the just concluded fiscal grew 3.1 per cent to 104.966 MT. 

"The production for sale of total finished steel at 104.966 MT, registered a growth of 3.1 per cent during April-March 2017-18 over same period of last year, in which contribution of the non-alloy steel segment stood at 95.004 MT, while the rest was the contribution of the alloy steel segment including stainless steel," the report. 

State-owned Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL), Rashtriya Ispat Nigam Ltd (RINL) along with private players Tata Steel, Essar Steel, JSW Steel and Jindal Steel and Power Ltd produced 62.626 MT during 2017-18. 

The rest came from the other producers, JPC added. 

"Overall production for sale of total finished steel in March 2018 (9.649 MT) was up by 5.7 per cent over March 2017," it said.

KOLKATA: The board of Maithan AlloysNSE 1.96 % Limited (MAL), a leading producer and exporter of manganese alloys has approved the company’s decision to set up a greenfield ferro alloy manufacturing unit in West Bengal at an investment of Rs 275 crore. The unit will have an estimated installed capacity of 1,20,000 tonne per annum of Ferro Chrome Alloys and is part of a drive to diversify the company’s product portfolio. The unit is proposed to come up within a period of 30 months and will be financed through internal accruals. 

The board has also authorised the executive directors and chief financial officer of the company to submit Resolution Plan under Corporate Insolvency Resolution Process for acquiring manufacturing company (ies) under the provisions of the Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code (IBC), 2016 and/or by participating in liquidation proceedings, an official statement said. 

MAL which announced its financial results for the year 2017-18 (FY18) recently said it has posted a 57% increase in profit after tax (PAT) to Rs 292 crore in FY18 compared to FY17, while profit before tax (PBT) went up 50% to Rs 376 crore in 2017-18, up from Rs 250 crore in 2016-17.Total revenue from operations increased by 40% to Rs 1,879 crore in FY18, up from Rs. 1,342 crore led by improved volumes & realisations. EBITDA for FY18 grew by 36% Y-o-Y to Rs. 377 crore from Rs. 277 crore. 

Commenting on the performance, S C Agarwalla, chairman, Maithan Alloys said: “Our results for the year are driven by favourable industry trends resulting into good volume growth for our product. It was enhanced by internal operating efficiency leading to strong profitability. The company has been improving its performance on the back of better product mix, better supply chain management and strong customer relationship.” 
 

Agarwalla said the outlook for steel Industry looks promising in the years to come with an estimate to reach 300 million tonne by 2030. While the company has announced a greenfield expansion to capitalize on these opportunities by diversifying its product basket, it is also strongly looking to pursue its acquisitions strategy, he said, adding “with a strong balance sheet and cash generation, we are well-positioned to execute the above strategic priorities.” MAL’s board of directors have recommen .. 
 

Data collected on the quantity and value of incoming aluminum products will help the bloc decide whether to take measures to limit imports.

The European Commission began an investigation last month to assess the need for potential “safeguard” measures for steel.. Steel imports have been under surveillance since April 2016.

The United States imposed import tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum in March, although the European Union and six other countries secured temporary exemptions.

The Commission, which oversees trade policy in the 28-nation EU, believes that the 10 percent tariff introduced by the United States has increased the risk that more aluminum will be diverted to Europe at depressed prices.

The EU official journal said that aluminum product imports increased by 28 percent between 2013 and 2017, while prices of such imports fell by 5 percent.

Significant oversupply has built up since the early 2000s, with most of the new capacity in China, the journal said.

It added that although China exports very little primary aluminum, this has depressed prices of the globally traded commodity.

In the European Union, only 16 smelters are still in operation, compared with 26 in 2008, and a number are at risk of closure, it added.

The surveillance will apply to imports of aluminum exceeding 2.5 tonnes.

Source: in.reuters.com

JFE Holdings Inc, parent of Japan’s second-biggest steelmaker, will spend 1 trillion yen ($9.1 billion) in the next three years mainly to upgrade ageing local mills but it also plans to step up overseas investment, its president said.

JFE outlined its three-year plan to March 2021 on Thursday, saying it included 900 billion yen in domestic capital spending, up 6 percent from expenditure in the previous three years.

The higher budget follows a strategy unveiled by its bigger rival Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal in March that earmarked 1.7 trillion yen for domestic capital expenditures, up from 1.26 trillion yen in the previous three years.

Japanese steelmakers are investing heavily in ageing domestic plants. Glitches at the plants, some of which are more than 40 years old, have prevented them making as much steel as they would have liked in the last financial year.

JFE said it planned to invest 100 billion yen overseas in the next three years, amounting to 10 percent of total spending.

But JFE President Eiji Hayashida said the firm was ready to invest more than 100 billion yen if attractive overseas deals came up, adding that this could boost total spending.

“Given our balance sheet, we will be financially viable to spend over 1 trillion yen,” he told a news conference, adding the 900 billion yen budget to upgrade domestic plants would not be reduced as those plants needed to raise productivity and become more competitive.

His company could spend an extra 200 billion to 300 billion yen on top of the 100 billion yen for overseas deals without hurting its financial health, Hayashida told Reuters after the conference.

Under the new business plan, JFE aims to raise average annual recurring profit for the next three years to 280 billion yen, against 216.3 billion yen for the year ended March 31, and boost its dividend ratio to 30 percent, up from its current target of 25 percent to 30 percent.

Source: in.reuters.com

It's quite obvious by now that JSW Steel Ltd.'s strategy to acquire insolvent steel companies has not gone to plan.

Of the five assets on the block, JSW targeted three - Monnet Ispat Ltd. with a 1.5 million tonnes per annum capacity, the 5.6 mtpa Bhushan Steel Ltd. and the 2.5 mtpa Bhushan Power & Steel Ltd. It didn’t see value in Electrosteel Steels Ltd. and stayed away from the largest and hence most prized acquisition target Essar Steel Ltd. (10 mtpa).

While competition Tata Steel Ltd. seems to have bet on a east-east strategy, hoping to consolidate its presence in that geography and probably make best use of its iron ore mines there, JSW opted for a west-east policy. With most of its capacity located in western India, JSW Steel was keen to acquire assets closer to eastern markets. So it gave Essar Steel, located on the west coast of India, a miss.

Only to regret that later. Tata Steel emerged as the top bidder for both the Bhushan assets, outbidding JSW by approximately 30 percent for each.

We put in our most competitive bids, says Seshagiri Rao, joint managing director and group chief financial officer of JSW Steel.

Why JSW Steel Lost Bhushan Bids

Rao said a higher bid simply was not viable for JSW. At about Rs 28,000 crore, the bid for Bhushan Steel was already 30 to 40 percent higher than a similarly-sized greenfield venture. “Our benchmark for setting up a million tonne steel plant is about Rs 3,000-3,500 crore. (Bhushan) is a 5.6 mtpa crude steel facility and finished steel wise maybe 4.5 mtpa. From that point of view we can create that type of capacity maybe in the range of Rs 15,000-20,000 crore.”

So, Tata Steel's bid at about Rs 36,400 crore is not an amount JSW wants to beat. The same rationale applied to Bhushan Power too.

“They have an iron ore mine which we don't have in Orissa, so that has to be exploited or taken out before its expiry by 2030. So if any additional asset is available in Orissa, they may be able to use that iron ore,” Rao postulates while trying to explain the gap in bids.

Trying Its Luck With Essar Steel

With just one of three assets in the bag, JSW is now trying its luck with Essar Steel. In the rebid recently ordered by the committee of creditors at Essar Steel, JSW has partnered with bidder Numetal, but only with a minority interest.

Numetal approached JSW, said Rao, not sounding very comfortable with the minority interest it now has in the bidding company.

Ideally JSW would like to go it alone for Essar and Rao finds hope in a recent comment by the National Company Law Tribunal that the Essar CoC should consider fresh bids if existing bids for the Ruia-family owned company are deemed ineligible again, and the two bidders, ArcelorMittal and Numetal Mauritius (an earlier avatar that partnered with Rewant Ruia), are unable to remedy the ineligibility.

“..they are confirming to the view expressed by JSW Steel initially. That is they (CoC) should have gone for option 1 where they should allow the new entrants also to submit their bids,” Rao said.

Electronic Bidding Best

Twists and turns in the insolvency resolution process are not unique to Essar Steel. Binani Cement Ltd., for which too the JSW Group was a bidder but not among the highest, is also facing delays in the insolvency resolution process. The second highest bidder, Aditya Birla Group-owned cement company UltraTech Cement Ltd., upped its offer after the bid deadline and is currently in court insisting its revised bid be considered by Binani Cement’s lenders.

On Monday, the NCLT allowed a late bid by business group Liberty House UK to be considered by Bhushan Power’s lenders, even though the resolution process is almost complete.

The unruliness of these bidding processes can most likely only be cured by an auction process, said Rao.

“Otherwise anybody can come even in the last minute and submit a bid and then say this bid is superior,” Rao pointed out.

Source: bloombergquint

Metals group Liberty House will invest $1 billion to grow its business in India within the next three years, its chief executive said on Tuesday.

“India is a huge market, it’s a sleeping giant. We are very focused on growing our downstream footprint in India,” chief executive Douglas Dawson told Reuters on the sidelines of an aluminum conference in London.

Liberty House Group, which has been snapping up distressed steel and aluminum assets around the world, is currently the preferred bidder for auto component manufacturers Amite Auto India, the company said last month.

Amite Auto supplies major carmakers such as Tata Motors, Maruti Suzuki and Ford.

Liberty House also made a binding offer in January for Rio Tint’s (RIO.AX), ROI.L aluminum smelter in Dunkirk, France, the largest in Europe.

“What we are more focused on is growing our value-add assets,” Dawson said.

Rio Tinto said in a statement at the time that the offer was worth $500 million “subject to final adjustments’ and it expected to complete the sale by the second quarter.

In February, Liberty’s owner Sanjeev Gupta said his company had no plans to slow its rapid pace of acquisitions over the coming year and could look to raise capital through debt or equity markets.

Dawson said the company was on track to list its steel assets by the end of the year.

Source: in.reuters.com

The European Union asked on Monday to join a dispute brought by China to the World Trade Organization over U.S. import tariffs on steel and aluminium, just over a week before U.S. President Trump decides whether they should apply to Europe.

The U.S. administration has set duties of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminium on grounds of national security, but provided a temporary exemption until May 1 for the European Union.

China has taken the United States to the WTO over the measures. The first step in the WTO process involves consultations.

The WTO said on Monday that the European Union had made a formal request to join the consultations as a party with a significant trade interest in the matter.

The EU noted, according to the WTO, that its interest was substantial because if the exemption ended then the U.S. measures would hit EU exports.

Hong Kong, India, Russia and Thailand have all filed requests to join the consultations. The EU is the first of the parties granted an exemption to seek to join the dispute.

Canada, Mexico, Australia, Argentina, Brazil and South Korea also received temporary exemptions. South Korea’s has since been extended indefinitely.

The European Commission, which coordinates trade policy for the 28-member EU, said that the bloc wanted to be granted a permanent exemption without conditions.

Separately on Monday, India, Russia, Norway, Singapore, Switzerland, Turkey and Venezuela joined China in expressing their concerns or disappointment at the U.S. metals tariffs.

A European Commission source said it was normal for the EU to seek to observe consultations and be able to submit its own views if it had a substantial interest and considered the WTO as the appropriate forum to settle disputes.

Source: in.reuters.com

The United States on Monday gave American customers of Russia’s biggest aluminium producer more time to comply with sanctions, and said it would consider lifting them if United Company Rusal Plc’s (0486.HK) major shareholder, Russian tycoon Oleg Deripaska, ceded control of the company.

Aluminium prices on the London Metal Exchange CMAL3 tumbled 8.7 percent on the U.S. Treasury Department announcement, which gives Rusal longer to sell off large quantities of aluminium it had been stockpiling in the wake of sanctions.

Last week, aluminium prices rallied to their highest in years after Washington, in response to what it called “malign activities” by Russia, imposed the sanctions that will in effect choke off access for Deripaska’s businesses to the international financial system.

Treasury gave Americans until Oct. 23 instead of June 5 to wind down business with Rusal. It said it would not impose secondary sanctions on non-U.S. entities engaged with Rusal or its subsidiaries.

Shares in Rusal (0486.HK), one of the world’s largest aluminium companies, jumped 17.7 percent on the Moscow Exchange. Earlier, Rusal had ended Hong Kong trading down 8.4 percent. Shares of its U.S. rival Alcoa Corp (AA.N) slid 13.5 percent on the New York stock exchange.

“Rusal has felt the impact of U.S. sanctions because of its entanglement with Oleg Deripaska, but the U.S. government is not targeting the hardworking people who depend on Rusal and its subsidiaries,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said.

Workers at one of Russia’s biggest aluminium smelters say their Siberian town is doomed unless Moscow mitigates U.S. sanctions against Rusal, a predicament mirrored across the company’s sprawling operations.

Deripaska owns a 48 percent stake in Rusal “and controls the company via his shareholder agreement with other owners,” said Oleg Petropavlovsky, a senior analyst at BCS Global Markets. “It is not clear whether potential cancellation of this shareholder agreement would be enough” to satisfy U.S. officials, he said.

Rusal declined to comment on the Treasury Department announcement. The Kremlin and Deripaska did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

NO LONGER ‘RADIOACTIVE’

European leaders have worked to persuade U.S. President Donald Trump to ease sanctions on Russia, with the president of France poised to visit the White House this week.

Mnuchin said “impact on our partners and allies” factored into the reprieve. French sources said initial feedback had been “constructive.”

Rusal now has more time to sell off its supply. Even if sanctions are not ultimately lifted, buyers also have more time to seek other suppliers.

Last week, aluminium rallied to its highest since mid-2011 on fears the global market could face shortages as a result of the U.S. sanctions. It remains up more than 16 percent this month.

Wood Mackenzie analysts said Treasury’s announcement provides “much-needed breathing space” for the aluminium market, adding “We expect near-term correction and volatility” in prices.

Edward Meir, an analyst at INTL FCStone, said there is potential for Rusal to survive and that “the 5 mln (million) tons of Rusal production that a week ago was arguably radioactive, will no longer be so.”

Source: in.reuters.com

ArcelorMittal , the world’s largest steelmaker, is on track to win EU antitrust clearance to acquire Italian peer Ilva after agreeing to sell a number of significant assets across Europe, two people familiar with the matter said on Friday.

ArcelorMittal has offered to sell its only galvanized steel plant in Italy, as well as units in Romania, Macedonia, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg and in Belgium.

Sources say that is a far bigger package of sales than originally planned as the company bowed to regulatory demands in its quest to buy Europe’s biggest capacity steel plant. The galvanized steel plant in Italy, Piombino mills, for example, makes 800,000 tonnes a year of the product.

The EU competition enforcer has been concerned that the deal may reduce competition in some flat carbon steel products and result in higher prices for customers in southern Europe.

The European Commission, which is scheduled to decide on the deal by May 23, and ArcelorMittal declined to comment.

Steel service center S.Polo Lamiere said it had provided industry feedback on ArcelorMittal’s concessions to the Commission.

“The global feedback was that those remedies were considered sufficient by the different operators in the market, so the feedback the Commission received from stakeholders was positive,” its CEO Tomasso Sandrini told Reuters.

The size of the divestments has prompted worries in some countries where the businesses to be sold are located.

Luxembourg Economy Minister Etienne Schneider on Monday wrote to European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, saying it was regrettable that regulators had demanded hefty asset sales from ArcelorMittal and that Europe needed a strong industrial base.

Vestager said she would make sure that buyers of those assets have the expertise and financial resources to continue operating them.

Ilva, based in the city of Taranto in southern Italy, has been dogged by charges of corruption and environmental crimes for years - charges that it denies.

It was also the beneficiary of two loans worth about 84 million euros ($103 million), which it will have to repay to the Italian state after the Commission ruled that these constituted illegal state aid.

Source: in.reuters.com

Chinese iron ore futures soared more than 4 percent on Thursday, supported by expectations that a move by China’s central bank to reduce the amount of cash lenders keep as reserves would help spur steel demand.

But some traders also say speculative trading activity may be behind the price surge, with supply of the steelmaking raw material staying high.

The most actively traded iron ore for September delivery on the Dalian Commodity Exchange was up 4.3 percent at 465 yuan ($74) a tonne by 0244 GMT, just off a session high of 470 yuan, a 2-1/2-week peak.

China’s central bank unexpectedly said late on Tuesday it will reduce the cash banks hold as reserves by 100 basis points from April 25, helping fuel a rally in prices of steel and its raw materials on Wednesday.

“What our central bank did will give some support to real estate projects, so there should be support for steel demand in the short to medium term,” said a Shanghai-based iron ore trader.

But he said the price increase in iron ore futures, which added to Wednesday’s 2.1-percent spike, may be temporary.

“This could be short-lived because we may also be seeing some speculative money,” he said.

Coke futures on Dalian was up 1.1 percent at 1,853 yuan a tonne, after jumping 4.8 percent on Wednesday while coking coal was steady at 1,147 yuan. Rebar on the Shanghai Futures Exchange rose 0.7 percent to 3,472 yuan per tonne, having climbed nearly 2 percent in the session before.

Stocks of iron ore at China’s main ports stood at 160.1 million tonnes on April 13, not far below a record high of 161.68 million tonnes reached at the end of March, data compiled by SteelHome consultancy showed. SH-TOT-IRONINV

BHP Billiton Ltd , the world’s No. 3 iron ore producer, cut its 2018 fiscal year iron ore output guidance by 2 percent to between 272-274 million tonnes, citing issues in its railroad car unloading system.

Iron ore for delivery to China’s Qingdao port .IO62-CNO=MB rose 2.1 percent to $65.88 a tonne on Wednesday, the highest since March 22, according to Metal Bulletin.

• Rusal produces about 6 percent of the world’s aluminum

• Sanctions are threatening to upend the global supply chain

The U.S. sanctions against United Co. Rusal are setting off explosions across global metals markets.

Consumers, manufacturers and traders are scrambling to secure supply cut off by Rusal, the largest aluminum producer outside China. Aluminum reached a six-year high and nickel jumped the most since 2009. Alumina, a raw material needed to make aluminum, notched a fresh record.

"It really is unprecedented in terms of the turmoil it’s unleashed,” Robin Bhar, a metals analyst at Societe Generale SA, said by phone from London. “It’s amazing to watch.”

The U.S. sanctions are threatening to upend the global supply chain for aluminum, which is used in planes made by Boeing Co. and Ford Motor Co.’s F-150 pickup truck. Rusal produces about 6 percent of the world’s aluminum and operates mines, smelters and refineries across the world from Guinea to Ireland, Russia to Jamaica.

Aluminum

The metal climbed as much as 5.2 percent to $2,530 a metric ton, the highest since August 2011. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said prices could spike to $3,000 in the near term.

Rio Tinto Group flagged it may need to cut production in the wake of sanctions. The company is working with customers to minimize disruption and remains in the process of declaring force majeure on some contracts, it said Wednesday.

Alumina

Alumina is being particularly affected because Rusal is a key producer, with plants in places such as Ireland and Jamaica. Before the sanctions, supply was already constrained by output cuts at Norsk Hydro ASA’s Alunorte refinery in Brazil, the world’s biggest.

A 30,000-ton cargo of alumina, the crushed ore feedstock which smelters use to produce aluminum, fetched $800 a ton, according to CRU Group analyst Anthony Everiss. The previous record for CRU’s index of alumina prices was $610 a ton in 2006.

Nickel

Nickel surged as traders speculated that other Russian companies could be targeted by U.S. sanctions. Bullish sentiment was also boosted after production slumped 18 percent at Vale SA and BHP Billiton Ltd. forecast higher demand for electric vehicles.

Prices jumped as much as 11 percent to $15,730 a ton.

Brazilian steelmaker Companhia Siderurgica Nacional is in talks to sell a U.S. unit to Steel Dynamics Inc for around $250 million, according to a report in the newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo on Tuesday.

The unit, based in Terre Haute, Indiana, has 350,000 tonnes a year in capacity, the paper said, citing sources close to the matter.

The paper said other companies such as Nucor Corp., Commercial Metals Co and ArcelorMittal SA had looked into the unit, but talks had progressed with Steel Dynamics.

Press and investor relations representatives for CSN and Steel Dynamics did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Brazilian steelmaker Usinas Siderurgicas de Minas Gerais SA reactivated a blast furnace on Tuesday and announced plans to raise domestic steel prices in June, but executives warned that new investment would depend upon political developments.

Shares of the company, known as Usiminas, rose over 2 percent on Tuesday on the outlook for stronger steel demand, driven by a growing recovery in Brazil’s auto industry.

The reactivated furnace in the state of Minas Gerais has the capacity to process 650,000 tonnes of pig iron annually.

Chairman Elias Brito told journalists that Usiminas was working out a long-term investment plan that would depend on the outcome of Brazil’s general elections in October.

“The indications we have for this year point to a small amount of growth, but without doubt the principal risk is politics, the type of government the country will have,” Brito said. “The principal analysis of the (investment) plan involves verifying that growth has come to stay.”

The imprisonment of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a former president and the leftist front-runner in recent polls, has thrown the presidential race wide open, boosting the odds of a political outsider riding a wave of discontent.

Brito added that the board of Usiminas has not discussed selling nor restarting operations at a major raw steel plant in the southeastern city of Cubatão.

Chief Executive Sergio Leite told journalists the steelmaker plans to raise steel prices in June. Usiminas expects increased sales in Brazil this year, he said, but the company will not export to the United States in 2018.

Shares in Usiminas rose as much as 4.2 percent on Tuesday on news of the restarted furnace in Ipatinga, but later pared gains to close 2.1 percent higher at 10.24 reais.

Source: in.reuters.com

MUMBAI: In one of the largest debt issuances this year, Tata SteelNSE 0.38 % has raised about $1.9 billion through syndicated loans for its Singapore units Nat Steel Asia and TS Global to refinance existing high-cost debt. 

It is part of a mega financial reengineering exercise undertaken by the country’s largest steel maker to streamline its international balance sheet, multiple sources with direct knowledge of the matter told ET. 

This will be among the largest fund-raising initiatives at the conglomerate after N Chandrasekaran took over as Tata Sons chairman in February last year. 

The loan is in two tranches — $1.29 billion and ¤469 million. Facilities are priced at about 200 bps above Libor and will have about six-year maturities, sources said. The fresh debt will likely have a 50-basis-point advantage over existing interest rates. 

About 20 banks, including JP Morgan, Citigroup,Bank of America-Merrill Lynch, State Bank of India, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank, are part of the lending syndicate. 

“The deal is almost done and the foreign banks are reselling the issue. An official announcement to this effect is expected soon. This will significantly bring down the interest costs at the Singaporean units,” said one of the sources cited above. Tata Steel didn’t comment. 
 

ET reported on January 18 that Tata Steel is planning a mega loan recast of up to $2.8 billion worth of existing debt to strengthen its balance sheet before its joint venture with German steel maker ThyssenKrupp takes off. Separately, in January, the company raised $1.3 billion by selling dollar-denominated bonds to overseas investors. 

As of September 30, Tata Steel’s gross debt stood at `90,259 crore. Strong growth prospects, particularly in the key operating markets of India, EuropeEurope and Southeast Asia, amid capacity removals in China, augur well for Tata Steel, analysts said. 
 

KOLKATA: Electrosteel Steels is set to become the first in an initial list of big defaulters to emerge from bankruptcy proceedings, with the National Company Law Tribunal’s Kolkata bench approving a Rs. 5,320-crore resolution plan from VedantaNSE 1.58 % Ltd for the company. 

This paves the way for the acquisition of Electrosteel Steels by the local unit of London-listed Vedanta Resources, the process for which is likely to be initiated 
shortly. The deal requires also formal clearancefrom the Competition Commission of India and the Securities and Exchange Board of India, which are likely to come in the next one to two months. 

A monitoring committee comprising representatives of lenders and Vedanta executives has been formed to manage the day-to-day affairs of the steelmaker, a job that was previously handled by Dhaivat Anjaria, the resolution professional appointed to manage the company’s debt problem. A team from law firm Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas, led by its national practice head of banking and finance Sapan Gupta, had advised Anjaria in handling the affairs at Electrosteel Steels. 

The Vedanta Group said it would make all efforts to turn the stressed asset around at the earliest. 

In a late evening notification to stock exchanges, Vedanta said a wholly owned subsidiary of it would acquire Electrosteel Steels’ shares for Rs. 1,805 crore and provide additional funds of Rs. 3,515 crore by way of debt. “Upon implementation of the resolution plan, the company will hold approximately 90% of the paid up share capital of Electrosteel,” it said, adding that the remaining 10% would be held by Electrosteel Steels' existing shareholders and financial creditors. 

The acquisition marks metals major Vedanta’s growing interest in the steel sector. While it has a sizeable presence in copper, zinc and aluminium and a toehold in iron ore mining through its Sesa Goa operations, acquisition of Electrosteel Steels will provide Vedanta a significant manufacturing presence in the sector. Vedanta has also bid for Essar Steel, the largest of the stressed steel assets, indicating its relatively newfound focus on the steel sector.