Size does matter for this Ivy League University
GIFT City is always in the news nowadays. Whether it is the regulator speaking about it or the various entities seeking to set shop in the International Financial Services Centre, the recent past has seen a lot of chatter around the special zone. While most marquee names from the financial services arena are already present at GIFT City or are in the process of establishing their presence, global universities are also looking at entering India through GIFT City. People familiar with the development say that a Massachusetts-based Ivy League university is now eyeing space at Gift City and is in advanced stages of negotiations to establish a campus. But the challenge they seem to be facing is shortage of land – they want a bigger piece of land than what they are being offered.
A subtle warning for the PMS body
When people talk about portfolio management services (PMS), there is always an element of mystery and arrogance attached to it. Mystery because there is a lot of discretion that the industry enjoys in terms of asset allocation and arrogance follows as these fund managers deal with the uber rich community – the ones that were shown to carry their cheque book in their coat pocket in yesteryear Bollywood movies. While much time has passed since then and cheque books are passe, some industry practices are not going down well with Sebi. Interestingly, the PMS industry that takes pride in dealing only with the HNI community has been told to take a leaf – a few leaves, actually – from how the retail investor-focused mutual fund industry conducts itself and evolves as an industry. APMI, which is the industry body of PMS players, has been told to learn how AMFI, which is the body of mutual fund players, represents the industry and works towards bringing in more transparency and enhancing overall trust among the investor community.
Tough days ahead for NBFCs?
NBFCs have always been looked upon as a relatively opaque part of the financial market when compared to their banking counterparts but the regulatory changes – tightening, one could say - over the past few years made the segment and its players quite popular among the investor community. The share price surge of some NBFCs corroborates the trend. But now a large section of the market is turning cautious on the segment as they believe that growth could see some amount of moderation going ahead along on the back of rising credit costs and stress in MFI loans. A leading domestic brokerage, which itself has been in the news of late for all the wrong reasons including regulatory action, believes that barring a couple of NBFCs, the going will get difficult in the near future for the segment and AUM growth will also be at much lower pace when compared to some of the earlier quarters. For investors, this means it's time to turn cautious. Better be safe than sorry.
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