The government’s 15 per cent stake sale in National Fertilizers Ltd (NFL) got off to a smooth start today with the portion reserved for institutional investors getting oversubscribed in the afternoon trade.

Through the two-day offer for sale (OFS), the government is selling 7.35 crore shares or 15 per cent stake at a floor price of Rs 72.80 a share.

The share sale would fetch about Rs 530 crore to the exchequer. Of the 5.88 crore shares reserved for institutional buyers, bids for over 6.73 crore shares came in, representing 1.14 times the shares on offer, as per NSE data.

Bids will come in till the close of market hours. OFS for retail investors will open tomorrow.

In the secondary market, NFL scrip dropped 6.72 per cent to Rs 73.55 a piece on the BSE.

The government holds 89.71 per cent stake in NFL. The floor price of Rs 72.80 a share is at a discount of 7.67 per cent over yesterday’s closing price of Rs 78.85 on the BSE.

So far in the current fiscal, the government has already raised about Rs 7,000 crore through share sale in four companies.Of this, Rs 1,207 crore has come from the initial public offering of HUDCO in May and Rs 1,192 crore through Nalco OFS in April and Rs 203 crore through RCF OFS in June.

Besides, around Rs 4,200 crore have been raised through stake sale in L&T held through Specified Undertaking of Unit Trust of India (SUUTI) last month. The government has budgeted to raise Rs 72,500 crore through stake sale in PSUs.

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