Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) will hold board meetings on September 5 to consider a 1:1 bonus issue for its shareholders. This means that shareholders would receive an additional share for every share held. As India’s largest company by market capitalization, RIL operates in diverse sectors such as oil, telecom, retail, and digital services.
RIL has a history of issuing bonus shares, having done so four times before. The first bonus issue was in October 1983, when the company announced a 3:5 bonus. This means shareholders received three additional shares for every five shares they held. Since then, RIL has declared a 1:1 bonus three times, with the most recent bonus issued in September 2017.
For instance, if an investor had 1,000 shares in 1983, this would have grown to 12,800 shares today due to these bonus issues. The value of these shares would now be ₹3.92 crore, showing significant wealth creation for long-term investors.
With the new 1:1 bonus issue, the same 1,000 shares would increase to 25,600. If approved, these shares would be worth ₹7.85 crore. The announcement led to a more than 2.5% rise in RIL’s share price.
If the bonus issue is approved, RIL will join the ranks of companies like Hindustan Petroleum Corporation, Wipro, Infosys, and GAIL, which have also issued bonuses five times. RIL’s bonus issues over the years have significantly increased the number of shares held by investors.
