This week saw the managing director and chief executive officer of the largest private sector lender HDFC Bank, selling 95% of his stake in the bank, estimated to be around Rs 843 crore. Based on the insider trading data that was published by the stock exchanges on Saturday, between July 21 and Jul 24, Puri sold 74.2 lakh shares of the bank. Before this transaction, he owned 77.96 lakh shares estimated to be about 0.14% of banks equity capital. Puri received 6.82 lakh ESOPs in FY2020. After an early low of Rs 765, the shares of HDFC Bank rallied 46%.
In December last year, he sold shares worth Rs 200 crore in HDB Financial Services, the unlisted NBFC arm of the private lender. Puri’s take-home salary was Rs 18.92 crore salary including perquisites but excluding stock options in the financial year 2019-20. The shares were held through a family trust named Vistra ITCL (India). Puri as part of succession planning transferred his shares to his family in the year 2013. The family’s shareholding was then transferred to the Trust, Vistra ITCL.
The search committee to identify the successor of Aditya Puri whose term ends on October 20, 2020, was set up by the HDFC Bank board in November last year. Aditya Puri who has been the managing director and chief executive since 1994 will act as an advisor to the 6-member group comprising Shyamala Gopinath, Sanjiv Sachar, M D Ranganath, Sandeep Parekh, Srikanth Nadhamuni and Keki Mistry.
The names of Sashidhar Jagdishan, Kaizad Barucha and Sunil Garg of Citibank are doing the rounds as some of the top contenders for Puri’s successor.

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