Aditya Birla group eyes re-entering securities biz
“We could revisit the securities business,” chairman Kumar Mangalam Birla told in a recent meeting. “But that is something that is still being worked on,” he added.
The move lends credence to the view that the Indian securities market is expected to grow sharply: Industry estimates say that total trading volume of brokerage companies is expected to reach $6,535.7 billion by 2015, from about $1,492.1 billion in 2005.
In 2003, in what was considered by market observers to be an undervalued deal, Birla Sun Life Securities, the group’s securities business, was sold to the JV Gokal group for Rs 10 crore. The unit, later renamed Brics Securities, last month sold its institutional business to US-based Lehman Brothers for an undisclosed amount. The institutional business in India is valued at about Rs 5,000 crore.
