Analysts expect Zomato shares to drop with founders and investors free to sell

Zomato has reached the one-year anniversary of its landmark public listing, and analysts foresee the date as an ominous one. The anniversary signals the end of the lock-in period for shares held by founders and other pre-public market owners, amounting to over 78 percent of total public stocks.

Speaking to MoneyControl last week, Shriram Subramanian, Founder and MD of proxy advisory firm InGovern, said, analysts expect selling pressure all week with the lock-in deadline over.

“As there is no promoter, all shareholders, including the founders, collectively owning 77.87 percent who were locked-in would be free to sell the shares without any disclosures on July 23," he said.

This prediction seems to have come true. Within an hour of the markets opening on Monday morning, July 25, the Zomato stock price dropped nearly 12 percent. At the time of writing this story, the stock price had already hit a daily low of Rs 46.80 per share.

Zomato shares were originally listed during its IPO at Rs 71 per share, but was oversubscribed by 51 percent. When the stock hit the market last year, it had reached Rs 115 on the BSE. During the course of the market bull run in 2021, the Zomato share price hit an all-time high of Rs 169.