SEBI Probing Spright Agro For Suspicious Share Issue Activities | Profit Exclusive

The Securities and Exchange Board of India is currently investigating Ahmedabad-based Spright Agro Ltd. for several violations, people in the know told NDTV Profit.

The markets regulator is probing possible violations related to preferential allotments, share splits, bonus issues, rights offerings, suspicious trading and offloading of shares by non-promoter entities, the people said. The alleged violations happened between August 2023 and April 2025.

NDTV Profit reached out to the company via call and email. However, a response was not received at the time of publishing this report.

The probe comes after several red flags emerged during a dramatic transformation in the company’s financials, capital structure, and stock price. SEBI is examining the sequence of events that began with the allotment of 2.5 crore convertible warrants to 35 non-promoter entities in September 2023 at Rs 22 per warrant.

These warrants, which were converted into equity shares by Dec. 15, 2023, accounted for nearly 99.55% of the company’s paid-up capital at the time, raising questions about control and dilution.

Between Aug. 18, 2023, and March 15, 2024, the company’s stock price jumped significantly despite extremely low trading activity. Only 10 unique entities traded the stock during this period, with daily average volumes of just 123 shares and around 13 trades per day, the people cited above said.

Ruchira Goyal and Glaston Menezes reportedly contributed significantly to the price surge, raising concerns over possible manipulation ahead of key corporate actions.

Spright Agro’s board had approved a 1:10 stock split and a 1:1 bonus issue in February 2024, which took effect on March 18, 2024. This alone increased the company’s paid-up capital 20-fold to over 50 crore shares. Another 1:1 bonus issue followed in November 2024, pushing the paid-up capital further up to over 107 crore shares. In total, the company’s capital grew almost 40 times within a year.

Amid these actions, the company also issued 3.34 crore shares on a rights basis at Rs 13.40 per share in June 2024, raising approximately Rs 44.87 crore. However, 16 out of 35 original preferential allottees sold their rights and earned a combined profit of Rs 29.56 crore, raising questions about the intent behind the rights issue.

More troublingly, between Oct. 4, 2024, and April 30, 2025, four of the preferential allottees net sold around 5.59 crore shares, booking profits of around Rs 65.8 crore, based on their purchase price of Rs 22 per share.

As of April 30, 2025, the same group of allottees still held around 92 crore shares, now valued at approximately Rs 345 crore at the prevailing price of Rs 3.75 per share.

SEBI is also scrutinising a sudden and significant improvement in the company’s reported financials. From the June 2020 quarter to the September 2023 quarter, Spright Agro’s net profit remained below Rs 0.51 crore. However, from November 2023 onwards—around the time of the preferential allotment and warrant conversion—the company began reporting profits above Rs 5.50 crore per quarter.

The regulator is also looking into changes in the company's leadership, with Akshaykumar Natubhai Patel taking charge as managing director from June 9, 2022, and Apurvakumar Patel joining as an additional director from March 29, 2023.

However, while the probe continues before the regulator, investors largely remain in the dark.