Infosys: To sell or not to, that is the question
What's the story
For Infosys, it's one bad day after another; the bellwether IT firm has too many things on its plate.
Trump's H-1B visa hiccup, its own dismal performance, automation, layoff issues and now reports are afloat that the Infosys promoter group led by founders Narayana Murthy and Nandan Nilekani are severing ties with the firm by selling off their stakes.
Here's all about it.
Tiff
Severing all ties
Narayana Murthy has been quite vocal about how things are being run at Infosys and his tiff with the current CEO Vishal Sikka is also well documented.
Other promoters are not too enthusiastic about the present scenario, thus the conclusion is to make a clean break instead of watching their beloved company in tatters despite their several warnings and suggestions to remedy the situation.
Sale
Everybody is tight lipped
If the reports are true, this would be quite a substantial sale as Murthy and his peers collectively hold around 12.75% stake in Infosys amounting to Rs. 28,000 crore.
It'll take some time to offload shares and when TOI contacted Narayana Murthy, he quashed the speculation by saying "It is not true at all," while Nandan Nilekani said, "I do not comment on Infosys."
Rumor
Sikka rubbishes claim
Vishal Sikka, when queried by ET, rubbished any such move and ended up praising Murthy, with whom he had quite a hostile relationship till a few months back.
He said that since Mr. Murthy has denied the rumor, there shouldn't be any room for speculations and innuendo. Infosys is already in a challenging situation and this only diverts them from their goals, said Sikka.
Dalal Street
Market, as usual, panicked for a bit
Infosys, in the meantime, also released a statement saying, "We would like to appeal to the media not to fuel such speculative stories as they are likely to harm the interests of the company and all its stakeholders."
Regardless of it, Infosys stocks fell 3% after the word got out across Dalal Street, but it appears to have recovered and is down 1.48%.