Brokerages have given mixed views to Reliance Industries (RIL) shelving a proposed plan to sell a 15 per cent stake in its oil-to-chemical business to Saudi Aramco. This comes even as the Saudi oil giant said on Sunday that it will continue to look for investment opportunities in India.

Analysts at Credit Suisse said the development is a negative surprise.

“We expected several synergy benefits from the stake sale. RIL’s procurement from Saudi Aramco could have increased...it could have also provided Reliance with access to technology for its chemical business and help boost oil to chemicals conversion to 75 per cent,” Nomura said in a note.

However, analysts at Bernstein said the failure of the transaction is unlikely to limit Reliance’s ability to fund growth in clean energy, though they admitted that it could trigger a negative stock reaction in the short term. The brokerage said the latest development does not alter the investment case for RIL.

“While the news could be sentiment-negative for RIL’s stock price, we see limited financial impact, given the de-leveraging achieved in the past 18 months,’’ a JP Morgan note said.

While the stock markets on Monday gave a thumbs-down to the announcement, analysts were a divided lot with some saying that it is a negative surprise and others pointing out that the deal cancellation will not make much difference to RIL’s financial position.