The alternative investment industry is looking to pitch India as a preferred investment destination to global investors, including non-resident Indians (NRIs).
With the country poised to become a $5 trillion-dollar economy in upcoming years, the industry that includes Portfolio Management Services (PMSes) and Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs) believes India is among the most vibrant emerging markets in the world.
Apart from listed equities, industry players are of the opinion that global investors can look at instruments such as private equity, private debt, structured products, credit funds, infrastructure funds and commercial and residential real estate.
“India's growth is looking more structural than before. With per capita GDP crossing $2,000 dollars and India exporting its vision of low-cost tech solutions to the world, India is firmly on its way to becoming an economic superpower. This will lead to disproportionate opportunities in both the private and public market space,” said Vikaas M Sachdeva, Managing Director, Sundaram Alternates.
Rapid growth
Experts say that PMS and AIF assets are poised to expand rapidly. The current asset size of alternative investments is Rs 12 trillion —around Rs 5 trillion in PMSes and around Rs 7 trillion in AIFs.
PMS Bazaar, a data aggregator for the alternative investment industry, believes the asset size of the industry is likely to hit Rs 30 trillion, or increase by 2.5 times, in the next three years.
Over a one-year period, AIFs grew 42.5 percent from Rs 4.87 lakh crore to Rs. 6.94 lakh crore at the end of June 2022. The total size of PMSes in India increased 18.38 percent from a year ago Rs 4.95 lakh crore (excluding Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation/Pension Funds), as of December 2022.
“In the next decade, Indian alternative investments will continue to expand at an increased pace. The growth of the HNI and UHNI (High Net-worth and Ultra High Net-worth Individual) population will contribute to this expansion, as the regulatory support and a wide array of asset classes offered by alternates will favour inflows. We also expect good traction from foreign investors, with the resilience of the Indian market and increased accessibility through the GIFT City route acting as a catalyst,” said R Pallavarajan, founder and Director, PMS Bazaar. GIFT is short for Gujarat International Finance Tec-City
To help connect global investors with the Indian alternative investment industry, PMS Bazaar is organising a one-day ‘Dubai Alternative Investment Summit’ in the United Arab Emirates on February 25, 2023.
The one-day event will cover topics such as ‘How India's Smart Portfolio Managers Create Investors Wealth’, ‘India's Manufacturing Renaissance’ and ‘Opportunities in Fixed-Income and Dollar-Denominated Funds’.
Industry leaders lined up to attend the event include Bharat Shah, Executive Director, ASK Group; Shankar Sharma, Founder, GQuant Investech; Vikaas M Sachdeva, Managing Director, Sundaram Alternates; Ravi Dharamshi, founder and Chief Investment Officer, ValueQuest Investment Advisors; and Saurabh Mukherjea, founder & CIO, Marcellus Investment Managers.
