Sterlite to raise $2 bn for power plant

Sterlite Industries (India), a unit of billionaire Anil Agarwal’s Vedanta Resources, plans to raise as much as $2 billion in its first share sale in the US to pay for a new power plant.

Sterlite, India’s largest copper producer, would sell shares that will trade on the New York Stock Exchange, the company said in a filing to the Securities & Exchange Commission.

By building a power plant, Agarwal is starting his second new venture three weeks after agreeing to pay $1.4 billion for 71 per cent of India’s biggest non-state iron-ore exporter. The response to the stock sale may show if he can achieve the goal of becoming one of the world’s top-five metals and mining companies.

Vedanta Resources, which owns 72 per cent of Sterlite, last month defeated rivals including Arcelor Mittal to buy Sesa Goa. The takeover gave the company its first iron ore mine in India, where steel demand is growing at almost twice the global average fuelled by the world’s second-fastest pace of growth.

Read more in The Business Standard article.