Meet man who lived in Mumbai chawl, became country's most-successful fund manager, now MD of Rs 297000 crore company, he is...

Majority of us are familiar with Kotak Mahindra which is an Indian banking and financial services company headquartered in Mumbai. However, not many people know about its Managing Director, Nilesh Shah.  

Who is Nilesh Shah 

Shah is the chief executive officer of Kotak Mahindra Asset Management Co Ltd (AMC). The company manages assets worth Rs 2.97 trillion. Kotak Mahindra AMC is India’s fifth largest mutual fund (MF) house. 

How Nilesh Shah started 

Kotak Mahindra’s MD Nilesh Shah belongs to a middle-class family which lived in a 210 sq. ft. room in a chawl in Mumbai. However, his mindset was entirely focused on education which shaped his personality of what he is today.  

Nilesh Shah graduated in Bachelor of Commerce from Sydenham College in 1987 and has a Chartered Accountant degree from Institute of Chartered Accountants of India in 1992. While he was about to join a massive engineering company in 1997, one of the company’s senior executives suggested financial markets to him. He then joined the ICICI group and started working in ICICI Securities. That was his first step in becoming one of India’s most successful fund managers. 

Shah led Franklin Templeton India MF's debt funds from 1997-2004, a period when debt funds outshone equity funds, earning him recognition as a star fund manager.  

Shah joined ICICI Prudential AMC in 2004, that was the time when the great Indian bull run started. Debt funds were a thing of the past and equity funds reigned supreme. Shah became the chief investment officer at a pivotal moment, overseeing both debt and equity funds. He assembled a strong team of fund managers and research analysts. 

Overcoming challenges 

Nilesh Shah’s journey was not very easy. He had to work all messy and go through struggles. His incredibility at charting courses is due to his education, he is a gold medalist Charted Accountant as he topped the exam in November 1991. His beginning at Franklin Templeton with managing debt came at the same time when Morgan Stanley India MF had just collapsed. “At many places, Franklin Templeton was not accepted as we were a foreign entity and they equated us with Morgan Stanley,” Shah recollects. 

Shah's first debt scheme raised a modest ₹35 crore, facing competition from assured-return schemes. Despite an initial bad investment, he learned from his mistakes and adopted a duration strategy. His efforts paid off, and his debt funds eventually outperformed equity funds. 

Shah's hard work paid off in May 2006, when ICICI Prudential MF surpassed UTI AMC to become India's largest mutual fund house, a milestone he fondly remembers.