Calcutta, March 28: Several companies have issued new shares under the employees? stock option scheme (ESOS) during February and March.

As always, the IT companies lead the pack with Infosys Technologies, Wipro, HCL Infosystems, Satyam Computer Services, Mastek, Patni Computer Systems, i-flex Solutions, igate Global Solutions, Hexaware Technologies, Geometric Software Solutions, Infotech Enterprises and Geodesic Information Systems offering stock options to their employees.

HDFC, ICICI Bank, ITC, UTI Bank, IDBI Bank, Gujarat Ambuja Cement, Larsen and Toubro and Max India have also issued shares under ESOS. Crisil also plans to consider allotment of shares against stock options granted to employees.

Apart from the issues in February and early this month, the board of Satyam Computer Services allotted 20,585 shares through circular resolution on March 24. After the allotment, the paid-up share capital of the company has increased from 31.92 crore units to 31.93 crore units.

The board of igate Global Solutions met on March 23 and allotted 22,436 shares under the employees? stock option plan. The grant price for 12,011 shares was Rs 100 each, 6,250 shares at Rs 116, 700 shares at Rs 186.6, 1,500 shares at Rs 104.8, 250 shares at Rs 133.05, 625 shares at Rs 248.17, 100 shares at Rs 110.4 and 1,000 shares at Rs 118.55.

On March 21, ITC issued and allotted 52,502 shares under ESOS, which increased the issued and subscribed share capital of the company to 24.82 crore units. On the same day, the Wipro board passed the resolution to issue and allot 1,65,133 shares pursuant to the exercise of stock options by eligible employees.

HDFC allotted 7,85,920 shares under ESOS on March 21.

ICICI Bank has also allotted 43,770 shares on March 21 under ESOS, while UTI Bank has convened a meeting to consider allotment of equity under the scheme.

While employee stock option plans have been popular globally for a long time, the Indian market got the taste of it in the 1990s with the influx of the IT companies.

A market analyst said, ?ESOS are mostly granted by services companies such as IT since in such firms, manpower is the most valuable resource and ESOS were used to compensate, retain and attract employees.?

These plans are contracts between a company and its employees that give the latter the right to buy a specific number of the company?s shares at a fixed price within a certain time period. Employees who are granted shares hope to profit by exercising their options at a time when the market price of the stocks are higher than when they were granted.

Here?s an example of a typical employee stock option plan: an employee is granted the option to purchase 1,000 shares of the company?s stock at the current market price of Rs 50 per share (the grant price). The employee can exercise the option at Rs 50 per share ? typically the exercise price is equal to the grant price. According to Securities and Exchange Board of India guidelines on ESOS, there has to be a minimum period of one year between the grant and vesting of options.

Thus, after a year, if the price of the stock increases to Rs 100 per share, the employee may exercise his or her option to buy 1,000 shares at Rs 50 and then sell the stock at the current market price of Rs 100.