RIL becomes the 1st Indian firm to cross $150 billion market cap

New Delhi, June 22 - Neftegaz.RU. Reliance Industries became the 1st Indian company to cross $150 billion in market cap as its shares soared over 8% intra-day after it declared itself net debt free on June 19, nearly 9 months ahead of schedule.

“I have fulfilled my promise to the shareholders by making Reliance net debt free much before our original schedule of March 31, 2021,” its Chairman and Managing Director Mukesh Ambani said in a statement. He assured shareholders that in its ‘golden decade’, RIL will set even more ambitious growth goals and achieve them.

In 2017, Ambani had said the energy-to-telecom conglomerate was on the verge of a golden decade where it would reap the returns of the largest capacity expansion in its petrochemicals business and the investments in Jio.

At the company’s annual general meeting in August last year, Ambani had announced his ambition to reduce the net debt of RIL to zero in nearly 18 months. Shareholders cheered the announcement that had come at a time when some international brokerages such as Credit Suisse had raised concerns about the company’s liabilities and cash flows.

The same day, RIL announced that it was in talks with Saudi Arabian energy giant Aramco for a stake sale in its oil-to-chemicals business at an enterprise value of $75 billion. This deal, which was originally expected to be closed by March 2020, has been delayed, but RIL managed to assuage investor concerns by raising funds through other sources.