Mumbai's skyline lit up at night across Back Bay
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Jio IPO · opens tomorrow

Jio says its debt is 0.36x. The footnotes say 1.73x.

India's biggest IPO got a big launch. The footnotes got a page number.

vizmaya desk · 20 October 2026

Why now

Fourteen days from filing to listing.

The filing runs past 450 pages. Bidding stays open for three days.

  1. 14 OCTPapers filedThe final prospectus (RHP) goes public.
  2. 19 OCTAnchor roundBig funds bid first. Bids of about ₹2.5 lakh cr were reported.
  3. 21 OCTBidding opensPrice band ₹1,065 to ₹1,119.
  4. 23 OCTBidding closesThree days. Hope you read fast.
  5. 26 OCTShares allottedWinners find out.
  6. 28 OCTListingTrading starts on the exchanges.

Sources: Kotak Neo; TechCrunch, 14 Oct 2026; Business Today, 20 Oct 2026.

First, the basics

An IPO sells a small slice. This slice is about 3 in 100.

A company lets the public buy a piece of it, once, on a stock exchange. All 27 crore shares here are new ones.

2.93%of the enlarged Jio, for up to ₹30,213.0 cr
The Bombay Stock Exchange tower in Mumbai
Photo: Niyantha Shekhar / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0

The company

533.3 million customers use Jio.

That was the count at 30 June 2026. The filing reports one business segment, so you cannot see how much comes from phones, home broadband or anything else.

A platform company that files as one line.

Source: RHP p.131 and p.200, as read by newboard and IPO Central.

Mobile phone towers standing against a sky full of clouds in India
Photo: Sristhid / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0. Illustrative: not a Jio site.

The front-page number

The front page says Jio's debt is small.

0.36xnet debt ÷ one year of operating profit (EBITDA). ₹27,579.2 cr ÷ ₹76,255.4 cr.

In plain words: Jio owes about 4 months of what it earns in a year. That sounds comfortable.

It is comfortable, right up until the footnote.

Source: RHP p.132, p.137, p.451, as read by IPO Central and newboard. Fiscal year to March 2026.

The footnote

The debt it left out is 3.8 times the debt it counted.

Jio bought airwaves (spectrum) from the government and pays in instalments. Think of a car loan, from the state.

The bill was ₹104,513.7 cr in March 2026. The 0.36x figure leaves it out. (One crore is 10 million.)

Source: RHP p.137, as read by IPO Central and newboard. Ratio is my arithmetic.

Do the sum again

Add it back and 0.36x becomes 1.73x.

(₹27,579.2 cr + ₹104,513.7 cr) ÷ ₹76,255.4 cr = 1.73. That is my arithmetic on their numbers.

The prospectus states the exclusion on p.137. It is not hidden. It is just not in the headline.

Same company. Same year. Different footnote.

Where the money goes

Most of it repays the cheapest loans.

₹27,500 cr of the ₹30,213.0 cr pays back foreign-currency loans that cost 1.40% to 5.13%. The spectrum dues stay.

Jio is not short of cash. It held ₹51,833.1 cr against ₹61,372.2 cr of borrowings in June 2026.

An Indian 2000 rupee banknote
Photo: Ravi Dwivedi / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Source: RHP p.116, p.118, p.121, p.451, as read by newboard and IPO Central.

The accounting

Longer asset life, bigger profit.

A tower costs money up front. Accounts spread that cost over its life, so a longer life means a smaller charge each year.

From April 2025 Jio counts network assets as lasting 18 years, not 16. That added ₹1,840.5 cr to FY26 pre-tax profit.

Nothing broke. Everything just got to last two years longer.

Source: RHP p.448, as read by IPO Central and newboard. The 9.64% is my arithmetic. Changing an estimate is allowed and was disclosed.

The interest bill

Interest more than doubled. Sales grew by a third.

Jio paid ₹8,653.4 cr in finance costs in FY26. That is up 113.8% in two years.

Revenue rose 34.1% over the same two years.

Growth is a team sport. Interest is winning.

Source: RHP p.447, as read by newboard and Multibagg. Revenue: FY24 ₹1,09,558.1 cr to FY26 ₹1,46,885.3 cr.

Who sells the plans

77 of every 100 rupees pass through one sister company.

Prepaid plans were 77.08% of FY26 revenue. Reliance Retail is the only distributor of them, and it sits in the same group.

Jio sold ₹1,12,935.1 cr of vouchers to it in FY26.

Customer concentration is usually a risk. Here the customer is a sister company.

Source: RHP p.31 to p.32, p.80, as read by IPO Central, newboard and Angel One.

The year nobody mentions

Revenue per customer rose. New customers fell off a cliff.

In FY25, monthly revenue per customer (ARPU) rose from ₹181.7 to ₹206.2. Net new customers fell from 42.5 million to 6.4 million.

The filing gives the numbers. It does not explain the drop.

Source: RHP p.131, as read by newboard and IPO Central. ARPU is for the exit quarter, ₹ per month.

The rule

A March rule change shrank what Jio had to sell.

Before, a company this big had to offer at least 5%. A rule notified on 13 March 2026 cut that to as low as 2.5%. Some sources say 1%.

Who asked for it? No document I read names anyone.

Sources: TaxGuru; IPO Central; Business Standard. Amounts in ₹ cr at the ₹1,119 top of the band. The 5% and 2.5% figures are my arithmetic.

Mumbai's skyline under monsoon clouds
Photo: Aj777x / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Akash Ambani, 15 October

Services, he said. A price date, he did not.

He said

  • Revenue per customer will grow mainly through services, not tariff hikes.
  • Jio keeps the option of higher prices.

He left out

  • Any date for a price rise.
  • How much of the FY25 rise came from price and how much from services.

Sources: YourStory (Reuters); Upstox. What he left out is my reading of the coverage, not his words.

The fair counter

Jio now makes real cash.

Operating profit minus capital spending was ₹42,071.1 cr in FY26. In FY24 it was ₹1,449.1 cr.

The exclusion is stated in the filing, and anchor bids of about ₹2.5 lakh cr were reported. Big investors seem fine with it.

A footnote is not a scandal. It is homework.

Source: RHP p.452, as read by IPO Central and newboard. FY24: ₹54,958.7 cr minus ₹53,509.6 cr. FY26: ₹76,255.4 cr minus ₹34,184.3 cr.

The finding

Jio's 0.36x counts ₹27,579.2 cr of debt and skips ₹104,513.7 cr of spectrum dues.

Not investment advice. I am not a licensed advisor. I did not open the full RHP: I read it through broker and aggregator pages that quote page numbers, so check the pages before you rely on any figure.

Sources & method

  1. Kotak Neo, Jio IPO
  2. IPO Central, Jio review (RHP page cites)
  3. newboard, Jio Platforms (RHP page cites)
  4. TechCrunch, 14 Oct 2026
  5. Business Today, 20 Oct 2026
  6. YourStory (Reuters), Akash Ambani
  7. TaxGuru, SCRR Rule 19 amendment
  8. IPO Central, public shareholding norms
  9. Photos, all Wikimedia Commons: Cididity Hat (CC BY-SA 3.0); Niyantha Shekhar (CC BY 2.0); Sristhid (CC BY 4.0); Ravi Dwivedi (CC BY-SA 4.0); Aj777x (CC BY-SA 4.0).