Jio Platforms filed its DRHP with SEBI on June 19, 2026, for a ₹~37,700 crore all-fresh-issue IPO — zero OFS — with ₹27,500 crore of the proceeds explicitly earmarked to prepay debt at its subsidiary Reliance Jio Infocomm (RJIL). The company reported FY26 revenue of ₹1,46,885 crore and PAT of ₹30,064 crore, but its Return on Capital Employed has slipped from 12.83% in FY24 to 10.76% in FY26.
Most people read the Jio IPO as a prestige event — Ambani, Mukesh, next generation, India's largest-ever listing. I get it. But a CFO reads the use-of-proceeds section first, and this one is unusually blunt.
Of the ~₹37,700 crore being raised, ₹27,500 crore goes straight to paying off RJIL's debt. That's 73 paise of every rupee raised walking right out of the IPO proceeds and into a lender's account. This is a deleverage play dressed as a listing.
Here's how a CFO thinks about it through the Capital Structure & WACC lens. WACC — Weighted Average Cost of Capital — is the blended cost a company pays to fund itself, part equity, part debt. Jio carries ₹70,000 crore in borrowings and a staggering ₹1.04 lakh crore in deferred spectrum payments to the government. That's a heavy debt load. Paying down ₹27,500 crore with fresh equity shifts the mix: less debt means lower interest burden, lower financial risk, and — in theory — a lower WACC overall.
But here's the CFO's real question: is the return on capital beating WACC? Jio's RoCE has slipped from 12.83% to 10.76% in two years — even as revenue grew 16% CAGR. Heavy 5G infrastructure spend is eating into returns. The CFO watches whether delevering now buys enough breathing room for those investments to eventually clear the cost-of-capital hurdle.
Equity from the public market is not free. It just has a different price.
📚 Learn the concept: Capital Structure & WACC
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