Atherstone plans broking foray

The Atherstone Group, a boutique investment bank, is looking at entering the wealth management business. The group is offering investors investment opportunities in both listed and unlisted companies, according to Managing Director Gurunath Mudlapur.

The Mumbai-headquartered company also has plans to foray into institutional brokerage in a move to provide "a 360 approach to investment services", added Mudlapur.

The group's portfolio management services (PMS) will have a base capital of Rs 1,000 crore. "The PMS will adopt a different approach. Many companies in the unlisted space are looking for growth capital. We will invest in such companies at the pre-IPO (initial public offerings) stage. We will look at opportunities among the listed companies as well," he said.

"Having started as an SME-focused investment bank, we have the research capabilities to understand and identify high potential companies. Such companies give unreasonably high returns to the investors," Mudlapur, one of the founders of the group, said.

The PMS will mobilise funds from high networth investors (HNIs) and ultra HNIs after getting regulatory approvals. The Atherstone Group, which manages a $100 million, three-year, opportunity-centric India fund, had started investing the corpus in real estate and SMEs, Mudlapur said.

Since the company began operations two-and-a-half years ago, it has advised clients on $500 million-plus deals, including private equity placements and foreign currency convertible bonds (FCCBs).

Atherstone has offices in London, Hong Kong and New York. The company is awaiting a merchant banking licence from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) to provide assistance to its Indian clients on primary issues.

"Our strength lies in the origination of deals. We work with managements of companies and convince them about strategic steps. We have the best people and a successful record in closing deals," he said.

Atherstone has worked with Wall Street banks such as Citigroup and Morgan Stanley in closing deals.

"Everybody has a competency in the market. The ultimate objective is to ensure that the task gets done," Mudlapur said.

Referring to plans on entering the institutional broking business, he admitted that this is a "highly serviced market."

"The cost of transaction is on the higher side in India. The challenge is to find ways to reduce the costs," he said.