Mr. Pradeep Kumar Das, the Chairman and Managing Director of the PSU Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA), has recently stated that the company aims to raise around Rs 25,000 crore from the debt market and around Rs 4,500 crore through equity in the current fiscal. Mr. Das also stated that IREDA had submitted a draft Green Taxonomy to the Ministry of New & Renewable Energy (MNRE) one and a half years back and that it is at quite an advanced stage.
“First, we are seeking the government’s approval for allowing natural dilution of their stake down by up to 10 percent. The government will take a final call on that,” Das said during the CII Financing Summit 3.0 in New Delhi. We have initially estimated Rs 4,500 crore by January-February in order to ensure that we have a fair amount of loan book as well as capital adequacy ratio which is very important,” elaborated CMD Das.
As per reports, IREDA is expecting it to be included in the list of companies that can raise funds through bonds covered under 54EC of the Income Tax Act and that the quantum of funds to be raised from this instrument was not decided. It is also pertinent to mention that S&P Global Ratings Limited last week assigned ‘BBB-‘ long-term and ‘A-3’ short-term issuer credit ratings to IREDA, with Outlook ‘Stable, which will enable it to expand its reach in the international market, tapping into attractive sources of funding and supporting its borrowing plan
Mr. Das said, “As important it is to get the rating, it is even more important to sustain the rating. So we’re going about it very responsibly. All development finance institutions and multilateral organisations have been associated with us since 1997 but we haven’t borrowed from them because the landed cost is high.“
IREDA’s capital adequacy ratio is presently around 20% and it needs to ensure this ratio at 17-18% to have a healthy, stable ‘AAA’ rating in the future.
