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India’s IPO boom is roaring — but much of the money isn’t building anything new
Even among the funds companies actually retain, growth is clearly not the priority. The largest disclosed use of fresh equity is debt repayment.
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R Suryamurthy - Sat, 29, Nov 2025
- 03:20 EST
- 9
Representative image / Pexels
India’s public markets are awash in fresh equity, yet very little of it is funding actual expansion. Companies filing for IPOs this fiscal plan to raise ₹1.82 lakh crore, but only about 16–17 percent of that total is slated for capital expenditure—a strikingly thin investment pipeline beneath a record-breaking issuance boom. The rest is split between shareholder exits, debt repayment and routine expenses, raising uncomfortable questions about how productively India’s hottest capital-raising cycle in years is being used.
The volume of activity is undeniably impressive. In the first seven months of the fiscal year alone, public-market fund-raising totalled ₹1.25 lakh crore across offerings, riding on the back of an all-time-high ₹2.11 lakh crore in FY25. Across the five years through FY25, issuances touched ₹5.66 lakh crore—more than the entire 15-year period between FY05 and FY20. Investor sentiment has been turbocharged by a 123 percent cumulative return on the NIFTY over the past five years, double the market’s pace in the preceding decade.
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