HCL Technologies Ltd. appears to be the latest IT company to join the share buyback bandwagon. The company's board of directors will be meeting on March 20 to consider a proposal to the effect. Shares of HCL Technologies closed 1.84 percent higher at Rs 855 on the BSE on Thursday.
In another significant corporate news, Reliance Capital announced carving out its retail health insurance business from its general insurance arm.
A few days ago, Infosys had initiated the first steps to a possible buyback of shares by seeking shareholder nod to alter its Articles of Association. The e-voting for the enabling resolutions opened on March 2 and ends on March 31 at 5.30 pm.
Shareholders can log on to www.evoting.nsdl.com for details on the e-voting procedure.
Read: Infosys likely to initiate share buyback; a look at its bonus history, capital structure
TCS announced on February 20 its decision to buy back up to 5.61 crore shares (or about 2.8 percent of its paid up capital) at Rs 2,850 per share.
The slew of share buyback offers come after Cognizant Technology Solutions (CTS) announced a $2.7 billion plan to buyback shares starting from the current quarter (Q1, CT 2017).
Last April, Wipro bought back 40 million shares at Rs 625 per share, or about 1.6 percent of its paid-up capital.
TCS ended 0.75 percent higher at Rs 2,519, Wipro closed 1.23 percent higher at Rs 499, Infosys gained 1.62 percent to end at Rs 1,028 and Tech Mahindra closed marginally higher at Rs 481. Mindtree shares gained 0.69 percent to end at Rs 471 apiece.
The BSE Sensex ended with gains of 188 points at 29,585, while the NSE Nifty closed 69 points higher at 9,154.
Adani Ports, Tata Steel, Bajaj Auto and Asian Paints were top gainers.
Reliance Capital ended with 8.47 percent gains at Rs 603 on news that the Anil Ambani-controlled company will be hiving off the retail health insurance business of Reliance General Insurance Company into a separate 100 percent subsidiary of Reliance Capital.
Reliance General Insurance had recorded gross written premium of Rs 570 crore for its health insurance business during the financial year 2015-16.
Gold and silver prices bound back on Thursday. Gold gained Rs 450 to close at Rs 29,100 per 10 gm while silver ended Rs 1,050 higher at Rs 41,350.
