Austral Coke & Projects IPO was subscribed 1.16 times on its third day of issue. The issue received bids for 84.05 lakh shares as against 72.6 lakh shares on offer.

The qualified institutional buyers (QIB)s portion was subscribed 1.20 times, non-institutional investors portion was subscribed 3.33 times and retail individual investor portion was subscribed 0.15 times.

The IPO has a green shoe option of 10.89 lakh shares. The company set Rs 164 to Rs 196-price band for its IPO, which closes on 13 August 2008. At the upper end of the price-band the company would raise up to Rs 142.29 crore, while at the lower level it would raise about Rs 119.06 crore.

Austral Coke mainly manufactures low ash metallurgical coke. It is also in the business of equipment rental, refractory and textile trading. The company plans to use the IPO proceeds to finance its expansion. It is planning a 1,50,000 tonne per annum LAM coke unit and a 8 megawatt captive power plant through waste heat recovery. The project is coming up at Sindhudurg in Maharashtra.

The company also plans to utilize the funds for acquiring coal mines either in Indian or abroad and retire high cost debt.

Austral Coke had concluded pre-IPO placement of 27.4 lakh shares to Somerset India Fund at Rs 196 per share, aggregating to Rs 53.70 crore.

The company reported net profit of Rs 35.17 crore on sales of Rs 226.66 crore in eleven months period ended February 2008.

|