Jio IPO has a flying start, shares subscribed over three times
India's largest initial public offering (IPO) got off to a flying start with Jio Platforms Ltd scoring the highest first-day subscription for any mega share sale, as investors jostled for a pie of the country's largest telecom company.
Investors bid for as much as 3.16 times of Jio Platforms shares on offer on Wednesday, compared to Hyundai Motors India Ltd's 0.42 times and the National Stock Exchange's (NSE) 0.72 times subscription on the first day of the share sale. While Hyundai Motors and NSE raised ₹27,858 crore and ₹22,562 crore respectively, Jio will raise ₹30,213 crore at the upper end of the price band. The early interest underlines strong interest in the long-awaited IPO, which closes for subscription on 23 October.
The company, which is selling 19.75 crore shares to the public (excluding shares sold to anchor investors) received bids for 62.36 crore shares totalling ₹69,763 crore, BSE data showed, or ₹47,660 crore more than expected. The deal was fully subscribed within 100 minutes, a rare feat for a mega offering in India.
Qualified institutional buyers (QIBs) such as foreign institutions and mutual funds led from the front, bidding for 9.42 times the number of shares reserved for them, and making up 74% of the total demand for shares. Except retail investors who bid for 73% of their quota, all categories were oversubscribed on Day One.
The strong institutional participation came on a weak market day, when the Nifty 50 index fell 0.34%.
“Jio Platforms was already India's largest IPO in terms of issue size. It has now also received the highest first-day bid value among mega-IPOs. Seeing this in a bearish market is even more surprising,” said Mohit Mehra, head of equity capital markets at Zerodha Corporate Advisors.
"Looking at the record demand across investor categories reflects the bullishness of participants in an otherwise volatile market,” said independent market analyst Ambareesh Baliga.
Jio Platforms made its anchor book allocations public on 19 October. Among the anchor participants, LIC received the highest, or 6.17% stake, of the anchor book. This was followed by New World Fund with 6% of the book, and the Government of Singapore with 4.2%.
Ashish Rathi, chief operating officer and wholetime director at HDFC Securities said, “The strong subscription is also driven by the attractive grey market premium. In many IPOs that did not see full subscription on Day 1, the grey market premium was not as high as it is for Jio Platforms.”
As per IPO Watch, the grey market premium for Jio Platforms was ₹250 as of Wednesday, reflecting a market expectation that the shares will open for trading 22.31% above issue price. GMP is the unofficial extra price at which an IPO's shares are traded in an unregulated market before they are officially listed on the stock exchange.
Retail participation, even though low, will increase over the next two days, experts say.
“Retail investors typically wait to gauge institutional demand before participating in IPOs. Strong participation from QIBs can lend confidence to retail investors. With no first-day advantage in allotment, retail participation often picks up on the final day when investors see the overall subscription,” said Pranav Haldea, managing director, Prime Database Group.
On Wednesday, Mint reported that financial institutions and brokerages have stepped up efforts to draw retail investors into the ₹30,213-crore IPO, as syndicate bankers aim for strong retail demand and a successful listing. The push comes at a time when the benchmark Nifty 50 has shed more than 10% this year, making it one of Asia’s worst-performing indexes.
Srushti is a markets reporter at Mint. She writes on equity markets, and her areas of coverage range from brokers and exchanges to mutual funds and the fast-evolving alternatives space, including GIFT City, from the financial capital of India. She has an experience of over three years in journalism, and has previously worked at Moneycontrol. She has an undergraduate degree in mass communication and a postgraduate diploma in business and financial journalism from Asian College of Journalism, Chennai.<br><br>Srushti prefers meeting people from the industry over making calls. Her work aims to drive impact—her story on illegal gold imports, for instance, caught the government’s attention and contributed to a policy shift. She specialises in turning complex market data into clear, engaging stories so even her grandmother could understand futures and options.<br><br>Outside of the newsroom, she enjoys spending money on jewellery and watching thriller films—especially the kind that keep her awake at night. She spends 1.5 hours a day commuting in Mumbai locals, listening to horror podcasts on her way to work. She’s also very talkative—so reach out only if you have lots of time.
Agnidev is a business journalist with over two years of reporting experience tracking the intersection of capital, policy, and corporate strategy in India.<br><br>He joined Mint in December 2025, after a stint at NDTV Profit (erstwhile BQ Prime). At Mint, Agnidev focuses on the high-stakes world of the Indian capital market, specialising in mergers and acquisitions, burgeoning IPOs, and the investment banking industry.<br><br>Backed by a rigorous, data-driven approach, Agnidev frequently breaks news on the valuation cycles, deal pipelines and listing strategies of India’s most prominent companies. His reportage offers deep dives into the operational health of market leaders across the corporate landscape, providing readers with a clear-eyed view of institutional growth.<br><br>He has reported on major issues like India's derivatives frenzy, IPO froth, the competitive quick commerce industry, the real-money gaming ban, and has broken investigative stories related to scandals such as IndusInd Bank's accounting manipulation and the Gensol-BluSmart fiasco.<br><br>As a reporter, he brings stories that ultimately affect your stock market investments, and tries to bring clarity and brevity in a field that is often filled with jargon and noise.
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