SEBI approves Lotus India AMC mutual fund

New Delhi, July 31: Lotus India Asset Management Company Pvt Ltd (Lotus India AMC), today said it has received the regulatory approval from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), for starting its mutual fund operations in India.

''India is amongst the fastest growing economies in the world, which Lotus India AMC is well poised to tap and nurture. Given the growth in mutual fund AUM of 61 per cent over the last year, and of 36 per cent over the last three years, coupled with a penetration of less than 2 per cent of households, we feel that the Indian mutual fund industry offers strong growth potential,'' Lotus India AMC Chairman Rana Talwar said.

Lotus India AMC is a joint venture between Fullerton Fund Management Group and Sabre Capital Worldwide, and its sponsor is Alexandra Fund Management, an affiliate of Fullerton (both Fullerton and Alexandra are wholly owned by Temasek Holdings Private Ltd.) Mr Rana added that with 115 employees across 29 cities, and over 4000 distributor tie-ups, the company already has the biggest ever infrastructure for an AMC at the launch stage in India.

''Our vision is to create a world class, global scale asset manager that can offer Indian investors solutions to their financial needs, across asset classes and across customer segments,'' he said.

The key strengths of the company lies in its 'Five Pillar Strategy' based on the key drivers of -- investment process and philosophy, product based marketing, anywhere-anytime distribution, regulatory compliance and its customers.

The company has appointed financial industry veteran Mr Ajay Bagga as its Chief Executive Officer.

''We have already invested in a scale that will allow us to rapidly build this business towards our objective of Rs 25,000 crore of AUM within the first few years of operations. Over the next few quarters, we are targeting a presence in the top 100 cities and a distribution footprint that ranks among the top five AMCs in India,'' CEO Ajay Bagga said.

Fullerton Fund Management Co Ltd (FFMC) is a Singapore-based fund management house, a wholly owned subsidiary of Temasek Holdings Pvt Ltd.

FFMC offers a wide range of products in Asia covering both relative and absolute returns strategies. The fund management division has developed portfolio management expertise in various asset classes -- cash/money market, global equities, global fixed income, global currencies managed on a relative as well as absolute return basis.

UNI