Avenue Supermarts CEO Noronha joins the billionaire club

Avenue Supermarts Ltd chief executive officer Ignatius Navil Noronha now holds company shares worth over a billion dollars, with the retailer’s stock rising 113% since the beginning of the year.

The stock set a new record of ₹5,899 on the BSE on Monday and gained as much as 10.7% during the day, with its market cap surging past ₹3.54 trillion. At closing though, the shares erased most gains on profit booking, after many brokerages downgraded the stock and cut the target price citing stretched valuations.

Brokerage firm Edelweiss Capital has downgraded the stock to reduce from hold and decreased its target price by 30% to ₹3,782; Phillip Securities cut its rating to neutral from buy and set target price at ₹4,913 implying a 10% decline from the previous target; Morgan Stanley has cut it to underweight from equal weight and reduced its target price to ₹4,338, down 19%; and ICICI Securities now has sell ratings from reduce and cut target price by 25% to ₹4,000 a share.

The stock ended at ₹4,894.90, down 8.16% from its previous close. In the last seven consecutive sessions, it advanced nearly 35%.

With this, Noronha, 47, has become India’s richest professional manager with his networth surging past ₹7,744 crore. Currently, Noronha has 13.13 million shares or 2.03% stake in the company.

Noronha achieved this wealth thanks to the 19-fold rise in the share price of Avenue Supermarts since its listing. The company went public on 21 March 2017 with an issue price of ₹299 a share.

Born and raised in Mumbai, Noronha completed his management degree from the Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies.

Before joining Dmart, Noronha worked with fast-moving consumer goods firm Hindustan Unilever. Founder Radhakishnan Damani hired him in 2004 as a head of business, and he took over as CEO in 2007.

On Saturday, the firm reported earnings which were better than expected. Revenues grew by 46.6% year on year. Gross margins expanded by 25 basis points YoY to 14.3%. Ebitda grew by 106.3% to ₹670 crore. Margins expanded by 260bps to 8.8%.