Acre ARC wins bid to take over Essel Groups' bad loans

Acre ARC has emerged as the successful bidder to take over the ₹1,350 crore debt of Subhash Chandra's Essel Group and also ₹2,613 crore debt of a portfolio of retail and SME loans from JC Flowers ARC (JCF) as the $378 billion Ares SSG backed bad loan aggregator consolidates its portfolio in India.

In both cases, Acre had submitted an anchor bid which has not been challenged. Acre had bid ₹237 crore binding bid at 9% all cash to acquire ₹2,613-crore debt for a portfolio of retail and SME loans, which was bought from Yes Bank by JCF while it had submitted a ₹505 crore bid to acquire five non-performing loan (NPL) accounts associated with Subhash Chandra's Essel Group against total outstanding debt of ₹1,350 crore in October. An Acre spokesperson confirmed that they have emerged as the successful bidders in both cases. JCF did not reply to an email seeking comment.

The Essel linked loans included NPLs from five Essel Group entities namely Pan India Network Infravest, with ₹727 crore of total outstanding, Taleem Research Foundation with ₹379 crore total outstanding, Mount Litera Education Foundation with ₹114 crore outstanding, Zee Learn Education Society with ₹98 crore and Gyanmala Public Education Trust with ₹34 crore total outstanding loans, ET had reporte in October.


The five accounts were also part of the portfolio of Yes Bank loans transferred to JCF in December 2022.

Essel Group owed ₹6,500 crore to Yes Bank, which were transferred to JCF as part of the ₹48,000 crore stressed loans the bank sold to the bad loan aggregator.