Housing Development Finance Corporation (HDFC) has sold 8,03,87,686 equity shares of Rs 10/- each of HDFC Standard Life Insurance Company (SLIC) to Standard Life (Mauritius Holdings) Ltd, representing 7.15% of the total issued and paid-up equity for Rs. 200 crore at a pre agreed price.

With this, Standard Life (Mauritius Holdings) will go up to 26%, the maximum permissible by foreign investors under Indian law.

On the other hand, after the current sale, HDFC’s stake will come down from 81% to 74 %.

HDFC and Standard Life Assurance Co. Plc have also agreed that any future sale of shares by HDFC to Standard Life (Mauritius Holdings) 2006 Ltd., if and when permitted by law would be at a Fair Value, an official release said.

HDFC Standard Life is one of India's leading private life insurance Companies, which offers a range of individual and group insurance solutions. The company plans to aggressively grow its business in the coming years. At presently, the firm has more than 270 branches in India, over 12,000 employees and more than 100,000 agents.

The Company said as per the plan, HDFC SLIC will go in for an IPO before the end of 2009.

HDFC presently holds market cap worth Rs. 81,061 crore. It had showed a net profit of Rs 646 crore for the quarter ended September 2007 as against Rs. 368 crore in same quarter of last year.

At 2:00 pm, the stock was quoting at Rs. 2915 on NSE, up by Rs 37.25, or 1.29%. It has touched an intraday high of Rs 2935 and an intraday low of Rs 2865.