Tata group wealth crosses $100-bn mark

New Delhi, July 2 (PTI): The country’s top corporate house Tata group’s stock market wealth on Friday crossed the USD 100 billion mark, as some of its companies including IT giant TCS gained value despite an overall weak market.  The cumulative market capitalisation of all the listed companies of Ratan Tata-led salt-to-software conglomerate today rose to Rs 4,47,351 crore, based on their share prices at the Bombay Stock Exchange.
Taking into account today’s RBI reference rate for one US dollar at Rs 44.5855, this translates into total market valuation of USD 100.33 billion for the Tata group. The group’s total market value stood at Rs 446,420 crore (USD 99.8 billion) yesterday. The Tata group comprises of nearly 100 operating companies, but only about 30 of them are listed in the stock market. These include TCS, Tata Steel, Tata Motors, Tata Power, Indian Hotels, Titan, Voltas and Tata Communications. TCS alone accounts for more than half of the group’s total market value with a market capitalisation of USD 52 billion (Rs 232,194 crore).
In an overall weak stock market today, when benchmark Sensex fell by 83 points, some of the Tata group companies managed to add value to their stocks. These included Rallis, Indian Hotels, Tata Communications, Tata Global Beverages, Tata Investment Corp, Trent and TCS. Tata group crossing the USD 100-billion dollar mark of market valuation today, coincided with TCS’s Annual General Meeting. Incidentally, Tatas had crossed Rs 1,00,000 crore market value mark with TCS’s listing on August 25, 2004, becoming the country’s most valued business house at that time.
Also, earlier in January this year, the Tata group’s market value had briefly crossed USD 100-billion mark, but a subsequent fall in the market brought down their valuation. Way back in September 2007, the Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries group had become the first business house in the country to attain a market cap of USD 100 billion. About month later, RIL alone had attained a market cap of USD 100 billion on October 18, 2007, but a high rupee valuation was also a key factor at that time. RIL’s market cap at that time had risen to Rs 4,07,748 crore, which was equivalent to USD 103 billion dollars at that time’s forex rates.
At the end of today’s market, RIL had a market value of Rs 2,82,217 crore, while its group valuation, after taking into account another listed company, RIL was Rs 283,014 crore (USD 63.5 billion). RIL shares today fell by about 4 per cent, thus becoming a major drag for the benchmark Sensex.