RIL to host 43rd AGM on July 15: What to expect

Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) will host its 43rd Annual General Meeting on July 15. The event, which will be hosted virtually this year owing to the pandemic and restrictions on large gatherings, will witness its 2.6 million shareholders gathering digitally to get an update on the company’s workings and its future plans.

Last year, the company had used the platform to announce its roadmap of becoming debt-free by March 2021. It had also proposed to sell its stake in the Oil-to-Chemical (O2C) division with Saudi Arabia-based Aramco buying roughly a 20% stake in the division among other things.

RIL has already kept good on its first promise by raising a total of Rs118,318.45 crore in thirteen consecutive deals in a span of mere twelve weeks by selling just 25.2% stake in Jio Platforms. It has also raised ₹53,124.20 crore via rights issue and an additional amount by sellings its stake in BP to petrol retail JV. Together, all these deals have helped RIL to become debt free. The company’s total debt stood at ₹161,035 crore. In addition to that, these deals have helped the company to raise an excess of ₹1.87 lakh crores.

At its upcoming 43rd AGM, the company is expected to shed more light on what made this feat possible. In addition to that, RIL is also expected to provide details of the Aramco deal that was expected to raise around $75 billion.

Apart from all of this, the company is also expected to detail a new strategy to further expand its Reliance Retail brand that has over 11K stores in over 1,800 cities across the country. RIL is also expected to share more details about JioMart, which got a fresh boost after Facebook acquired a 9.99% stake in Jio Platforms, a deal which also included increased participation between WhatsApp and JioMart.

Lastly, Reliance Industries has traditionally used its AGM to launch new products and services. In 2017, the company launched JioPhone. In 2018, the company announced its Jio Hungama offer and in 2019, the company announced a major investment in creating digital infrastructure across the country. Reliance Industries is expected to continue with this trend. However, with JioMeet being unveiled recently, the details remain hard to guess.