New York Life picks up 24% in Delhi finance firm

New York Life Investment Management Holding (NYLIM) has picked up 24.6 per cent stake in the Delhi-based Jacob Ballas Capital India to manage its growing private equity exposure in the country.

NYLIM, a wholly owned subsidiary of New York Life Insurance, has earmarked $60 million of its own funds for private equity deals in the country besides the $140 million expected to be raised from third-party investors.

"We would also invest $30-40 million in a public fund that would invest in secondary equity markets," Brian A Murdock, president, NYLIM said at a press conference.

The public fund would also be managed by Jacob Ballas and the fund would begin operation once the secondary market operations team is in place.

On the Indian equity markets, Brian said while the markets appear to be somewhat stretched in the short run, from a long term perspective it was attractive.

Of the $60 million committed in private equity, NYLIM has already invested $20 million in Punj Lloyd, Reliance Energy and ABG Shipyard.

NYLIM, with $4 billion invested in private equity globally, expects that money from the $140 million to be raised from the third party investors globally would be available for investment from the second quarter of 2006.

'We are optimistic on the infrastructure sector in India and sectors which cater to the growing domestic consumption. Privatisation of airports, green field airport projects, road and banking are some of the interesting sector,' Murdock, said.

NYLIM, unlike many other private equity players does not have minimum investment cut-off or sectoral focus while scouting for investment opportunities.

NYLIM has bought the stake in Jacob Ballas from a Singapore based investment company. Jacob Ballas which has been valued at $10 million, would exclusively manage NYLIM's investments in India and has been working closely with the company since 1999. It managed New York Life Insurance's joint venture deal in India. Jacob Ballas is headed by Rajan Jetley who had earlier been CEO of Air India.

NYLIM had as part of its earlier investment invested $38 million in companies such as Bharti Televentures, Gujarat Pipavav Port and Thomson Press.