Sanjiv Goenka may have won the bid for Rising Pune Supergiants (RPS) for just two editions of the Indian Premier League (IPL) — IPL 2016 and IPL 2017 — but that did not deter him from bidding the maximum amount at the auction conducted on Monday. The RP-Sanjiv Goenka group chairman splurged Rs 17.20 crore, including a staggering Rs 14.5 crore to acquire Ben Stokes.
Read: How the squads of all eight teams look after the player auction - full team list
The next highest bidder was RCB at Rs 15.4 crore, followed by KKR (co-owned by Shah Rukh Khan) at Rs 14.35 crore. In all, there were eight teams.
The RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group, which has an asset base of close to Rs 32,000 crore, has interests across a wide range of businesses comprising retail, information technology, carbon black, entertainment, power utility and of course, sports.
His brother Harsh Goenka's RPG Group owns tyre maker Ceat, IT company Zensar Technologies, pharma company RPG Life Sciences, infra firm KEC International and plantations firm Harrisons Malayalam.
The Group's flagship entity is CESC, a power utility company that recently bagged a project to supply electricity in Bikaner. Spencer's has a presence in retail while Saregama (formerly HMV) derives its income from cinema, music and television content. Firstsource is the group's IT outsourcing arm.
CESC shares were trading at Rs 876 apiece on Tuesday at around 10.10 am on the Bombay Stock Exchange after hitting a fresh 52-week high of Rs 878, while Saregama was up 1.17 percent at Rs 212. Philips Carbon Black was trading flat at Rs 296.
The BSE Sensex was up 21 points at 28,683, while the NSE Nifty was trading 11 points higher at 8,890. Top Sensex gainers were Tata Steel, Tata Motors, GAIL (India) and Wipro.
Other stocks that had hit a fresh 52-week high on Tuesday morning include Jindal Steel, KEC International, Vedanta, RBL Bank and Federal Bank.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which announced a share buyback plan valued at Rs 16,000 crore, was almost flat at Rs 2,509. The company has offered Rs 2,850 per share for the buyback plan.
Gold stocks such as Titan, PC Jewellers and Tribhovandas Bhimji Zaveri (TBZ) were trading in a narrow range. Purchase of jewellery could take a hit when the new provision kicks in from April 1, 2017 as proposed in the Union Budget 2017.
Cash purchases of jewellery above Rs 2 lakh per transaction will attract a tax provision of 1 percent as against the current limit of Rs 5 lakh.
The provision will come into force once the Finance Bill 2017 is passed by the Parliament when it reconvenes for the budget session.
