Date:23/02/2005 URL: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2005/02/23/stories/2005022301751000.htm

Back Infy's ADS issue likely next fiscal

Our Bureau

Bangalore , Feb. 22

INFOSYS Technologies' secondary sponsored ADS issue is likely to hit the market in the beginning of the next financial year. Sources familiar with the issue told Business Line that it is not possible in March.

This means that the ADS issue may come only after the company announces its fourth quarter and annual results for the current fiscal sometime in the third week of April. Infosys normally gives its earnings guidance for the next financial year, while announcing its annual results.

Speculation is that a later than expected approvals from the US market regulator Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Foreign Investment Promotion Board may have forced it to go slow with the issue. Infosys got the SEC approval for the proposed issue sometime late January while it received the FIPB approval early this month. The company plans to convert up to 16 million equity shares into American Depository Shares through the proposed issue. The issue is expected to help Infosys increase its stock float by some six per cent to 13.9 per cent on the Nasdaq, where Infy is traded at a huge premium over local shares. Of the 267.86 million shares of Infosys in the secondary market, about 21.24 million shares are listed on the Nasdaq, constituting 7.9 per cent of the total stock.

Infosys, as per its filing to the SEC in January, had indicated an offer price of $69.90 per share, which makes the total issue size at over a billion dollars.