Petronet LNG on roller-coaster ride

Petronet LNG is having one roller-coaster ride today. Reacting to the Houston speech where the company was named by Trump as having signed a $2.5 billion MoU, the stock hit the 15% UC at Rs.293.50 and went on to hit a new 52-week high at R.302. But after that it slipped, so much so that it figured among the top five losers on the BSE, going down almost 7.5% to Rs.247. It has recovered from this intraday low but remains in the red. Volumes were huge at over 34 times.

Tellurian Inc. has signed a $7.5 billion agreement for India’s Petronet LNG Ltd to buy a stake in its proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in Louisiana. Petronet will spend $2.5 billion for an 18% equity stake in the $28 billion Driftwood LNG terminal and negotiate the purchase of 5 million tonnes of gas per annum. The remainder of the total will come from debt.

The market is now worried about the debt and how much all this will cost the balance sheet. And that is what is reflected in the initial euphoria and then after reading the fine print, reality sunk in.