PMS client base drops by a fifth in one year despite boom in markets

Experts believe tightening of rules before the pandemic led to decline

Portfolio managers have seen over a fifth of their clients drop off over the course of a year despite booming markets.

Portfolio management service (PMS) providers had 163,684 clients in May 2020. This has dropped 21.2 per cent to 128,994 as of May 2021, shows data compiled from a monthly regulatory bulletin. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) releases PMS data with a lag. The latest May data was released earlier in August.

Among the reasons that experts believe contributed to this decline include a tightening of rules before the pandemic. Curiously, the surge in the stock markets