At $18.4 billion, RIL tops global share sale chart this year

Mumbai: Equity offerings involving Reliance Industries and its group units have topped the share sale chart across all listed companies globally so far in 2020.

According to a study of Bloomberg data and company announcements of all equity offerings, the Mukesh Ambani-controlled conglomerate has mopped up $18.4 billion through this route. The other companies in demand have been US-based money manager Blackrock, in which shares worth $13.3 billion changed hands, and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, in which stake worth $11 billion was picked up. Other companies whose big chunks of shares have found takers include Singapore Airlines, Brazil’s Petrobras and US-based Southwest Airlines.

The highest equity offering in a year was from Saudi Arabia’s oil giant Aramco, which raised about $29.4 billion last December through initial public offering, beating previous record of Alibaba Group Holding’s $25 billion in 2014.