Indiabulls broking arm Indiabulls Securities will hold 24.5% stake in the group's insurance joint venture with French banking giant SocGen's arm Sogecap. According to the earlier plan, the promoters and other directors with Indiabulls Financial Services - the holding arm of the group -were to pick up the stake in their individual capacity.
According to the disclosures to the stock exchange, the change in shareholding structure follows an objection raised by insurance regulator IRDA. The regulator apparently had reservations to the individuals subscribing to the share capital in the insurance venture of the group Indiabulls Life Insurance Company (ILICL). No details of the objections raised by the regulator were made public.
The board of the firm includes co-founders Sameer Gehlaut, Rajiv Rattan and Saurabh Mittal, besides Gagan Banga and Aishwarya Katoch among others. It is not clear who all were looking to pick stakes in ILICL.
According to the revised shareholding structure, Indiabulls Securities will hold 24.5% stake and Indiabulls Financial Services 49.5%. The remaining 26% will be held by Sogecap in line with the maximum foreign investment in the insurance sector.
Indiabulls Financial Services, holding in the insurance firm is capped at 49.5% to comply with the norms as it is a non banking finance company.
Indiabulls Securities board gave its green signal to pick the stake at its meeting held on September 23, 2008. The new venture ILICL has submitted a proposal for this to IRDA.
Indiabulls Financial and Sogecap had announced a JV to foray into the domestic life insurance market last year with an initial capital of Rs 300 crore. Sogecap runs life insurance business in over 10 countries and is the third-largest insurance company in France. It was announced that Sogecap will hold a 26% stake in the venture, while Indiabulls Financial holding the balance 74%. Indiabulls Securities was spun out as a separate listed firm early this year.