Blue Dart share sale gets covered nearly four times

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Global logistics services provider DHL Express' share sale in India's Blue Dart Express Ltd (BLDT.NS) was covered nearly four times in a $172 million deal, revised stock exchanges data showed on Friday.

The share auction, launched by DHL Express to meet the stock market regulator's directive that bars owners to hold more than 75 percent stake in listed Indian companies, got bids for 5.2 million shares against the 1.4 million on offer, data showed.

DHL Express owned 81.03 percent of Blue Dart at the end of September 30, according to the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The stock exchanges had earlier shown that investors bid for 3.9 million shares at the close of the auction at 3.30 p.m, which was revised later.

The weighted average price of the bids was 1,833.08 rupees a share, at which the deal was worth 9.5 billion rupees, but it was not immediately clear whether DHL Express would accept all the bids.

DHL Express had set a floor price of 1,720 rupees per share.

Shares of Blue Dart, closed 3.39 percent lower at 1989.80 rupees, while the Sensex ended down 0.1 percent.

Citigroup was the sole adviser to the share sale.

(Reporting by Indulal PM; Writing by Sumeet Chatterjee; Editing by Prateek Chatterjee)