Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd (DHFL) shares are down 64.11% so far this year

DHFL or Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Limited shares fell more than 3 per cent on Tuesday, a day after the mortgage lender said it had paid the interest and principal on certain debt instruments which was due on Monday and completed a stake sale in Aadhar Housing Finance. A plunge in Dewan Housing Finance (DHFL) shares in the past few sessions had refuelled concerns about the financial health of the country's non-banking financial company (NBFC) sector. DHFL shares opened higher on stock exchanges BSE and NSE, but soon gave up all of the day's gains to trade in the negative zone.

On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the DHFL stock declined as much as 3.35 to Rs 86.55 apiece in late morning deals, compared to its previous close of Rs 89.55. On the BSE, Dewan Housing Finance shares fell 3.24 per cent to an intraday low of Rs 86.60 apiece.

In a regulatory filing on Monday, DHFL said it paid Rs. 10.02 crore in interest on four non-convertible debentures (NCD) and Rs. 35 crore in principal on one of them.

The payment came days after credit ratings agencies ICRA and Crisil categorised the company's commercial paper at default levels for missing bond payments.

In a regulatory filing last Wednesday, Dewan Housing Finance had said the action by the ratings agencies was "extremely surprising" as it had been making substantial efforts in ensuring no defaults on repayment of its financial obligations. DHFL said it is "committed towards ensuring repayment of all its obligations as well as onboarding the strategic partner for its business".

Dewan Housing Finance shares are down 19.80 per cent since then, and 64.11 per cent so far this year.

The company also noted that it completed the stake sale in Aadhar Housing Finance to an entity backed by Blackstone Group LP.

Investors are concerned about the NBFC sector since a series of defaults by Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (IL&FS) last year triggered fears about a contagion.

At 10:45 am, DHFL shares traded 0.56 per cent lower at Rs 89.00 apiece on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), underperforming the benchmark Sensex index which was up 0.16 per cent.

(With agency inputs)