India has given rise to several exceptionally accomplished and impactful investors, each distinguished by their distinct investment approaches and philosophies. In this piece, we will dive into the stories of the top 10 iconic Indian investors, uncovering their investment strategies, and drawing valuable insights from their journeys in the world of finance.
The Context
You do not succeed without obsession — Rakesh Jhunjhunwala
Inordinately sensational stories and free guidance are two peculiar traits that Indian stock markets are well known for.
If you’re looking for any of those, our limited selection might not satisfy you. We won’t compare investors based on their properties, cars, wealth, or lifestyle. Our “Top 10 List of Indian Investors” is going to examine anecdotes from their struggles, proficiencies, and all-around mental conditioning. After all, aren’t these most pertinent variables that have made them what they are today?
Every industry has developed professionals over the years. These professionals are generally pioneering leaders or significant figures within a particular field. Because they provide the most value through their experiences, opinions, and trustworthy expertise, industry experts play a crucial role in our community.
People who have developed expertise in particular areas are, by definition, able to think effectively about problems in those areas. Understanding aptitudes is crucial for mastering any subject since it simply sheds light on how successful people think and solve problems.
Without any delays let’s dive right in.
1. Rakesh Jhunjhunwala (R.I.P)
The story of Rakesh Jhunjhunwala takes the first spot on this list of top-10 Indian investors. A self-made billionaire and popularly referred to as the Big Bull of India, RJ started his investing career in 1985 with his modest savings of ₹5,000.
Sensex was at 354 points back then, it hovers at around 55,550 today
The average inflation in India (as per CPI Index) over the past 37 years is at 7.42%. So, if he were to start investing today, ₹5,000 in 1985 would be equivalent to ₹67,800.
It is said that he has inherited certain investing quirks from his ancestors. When Jhunjhunwala saw his father talking to his friends about the stock market, he became interested in it. While providing him with market guidance, his father never offered him any money to invest and banned him from approaching acquaintances for loans.
He is an intelligent, well-educated, and skilled individual who has always known what he was doing before entering the stock market. Jhunjhunwala graduated from Sydenham College in 1985 as a Chartered Accountant (The Institute of Chartered Accountants of India). The dramatic version of his story often glamorizes humble beginnings with ₹5000 capital in 1985, which has supposedly grown to ₹45,000 crores today.
The important fact to quote here is that it’s not the same ₹5000 capital that has grown into a massive portfolio over time. Mr. Jhunjhunwala has seemingly taken a lot of calculated risks, leveraged money, and executed the right decisions over the years.
As an example of his conviction, soon after his legendary ₹5000 investment, he borrowed ₹2.5 lakhs from one of his brother’s clients by promising to give higher returns compared to the fixed deposits. His success story proceeds with the great bargains and high-volume purchases of Sesa Goa, now Vedanta (1989), Titan (2002), Lupin (2003), and so on.
He now has investments in numerous firms and is an established businessman. Jhunjhunwala credits Radhakishan Damani and Ramesh Damani as his mentors in addition to his father, who served as his first mentor.
2. Radhakishan Damani
Mr. Damani takes the second spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Radhakishan Damani or RK Damani is one of the most unpretentious and thriving investors in India.
He is also known as the ‘Mr. White and White’ among the top traders in India. He is one of the few self-made billionaires in the country and comes from humble outsets. Damani was raised in a Marwari family in a single-room apartment in Mumbai.
He studied commerce at the University of Mumbai but dropped out after one year. After the death of his father who worked on Dalal Street, Damani left his ball-bearing business and became a stock market broker and investor.
He made huge profits from his stock trading practice and believed in making profits using different market swings. His biggest stock market wins were recorded during the 1990s when he was short-selling stocks that were inflated by illegal means – courtesy of Harshad Mehta.
A twist in his story came around the year 2000 when he suddenly quit the stock market business and decided to enter the retail industry. The result was a DMart store in Powai (Mumbai) in 2002. Following the sound expansion strategies, the chain had 25 stores by 2010, after the company grew rapidly and went public in 2017.
Just like Walmart, DMart is now the one-stop supermarket and hypermarket chain in India. His supermarkets and hypermarkets are present at a whopping 196 locations in 72 cities across 11 states in the country.
The business acumen and success that he gained from his life pursuits have made him the 2nd richest person in the country after Mukesh Ambani and the 98th richest person in the world. RK Damani lives a very simple life and most of the time he wears a simple white shirt and white trousers.
He avoids public gatherings and media coverage. He does not consider himself a highly educated person.
3. Ramesh Shrichand Damani
Mr. Ramesh Damani takes the third spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Ramesh Damani is a member of the Bombay Stock Exchange.
He is one of the most successful investors in India. A follower of the Buffett style of value investing, Mr. Damani’s views about equity are ardently followed by many investors. He completed his undergraduate at HR College and postgraduate at California State University.
Ramesh gradually developed an interest in the stock market, which was his father’s line of work, despite initially having no interest in it. He belonged to an upper-middle-class family. His father worked in the stock market for the past two decades and had a well-earned salary through which he was able to send Ramesh abroad for his higher studies.
Ramesh’s father is the main reason behind Ramesh’s decision to join the stock market field. Even though Damani is a successful stock marketer, initially, he lost $10,000 in the U.S. stock market.
As the legend goes, his father sent him $10,000 and asked him to take all of the money and invest it, and during this period, if he could double the money, he could keep all of it. If he wasn’t able to, his father would not utter a single question in his direction regarding the money. Ramesh thought this was a good bet and agreed to it, so he invested the given amount in various stocks in the stock market.
To his disappointment, he ended up losing whatever he invested in just six months, this shocked and disturbed him. He took it to his ego that finally helped him build his interest in the market. Ramesh first achieved fame in 1993, the year Infosys went public. Ramesh was a programmer living in the US at the time, so he knew better than to seize the chance.
To increase his chances of success, he chose to invest 10 lakhs in Infosys and CMC. By the year 1999, his investments had significantly increased.
4. Raamdeo Agrawal
Mr. Raamdeo Agrawal takes the fourth spot on this list of the top 10 Indian investors. Raamdeo Agrawal is an Indian businessman, stock market investor, and Chairman of Motilal Oswal Group which he co-founded with Motilal Oswal in 1987.
He considers Warren Buffett as his mentor and says that his investment strategy is largely inspired by him. Agrawal was born into a middle-class Marwari family. Raamdeo is a Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India.
He was brought up in a village in Chhattisgarh. After gaining their professional alma mater in chartered accountancy in Mumbai he began his career as a sub-broker in 1987. He co-founded Motilal Oswal Financial Services and his family today owns about 36% of the company.
By the time Agarwal became a sub-broker, he was able to build a portfolio of ₹10 lac. This grew to almost ₹30 crores during the bull run of the Harshad Mehta scam of the 1990s however it fell to 10 crores after the scam was exposed.
Later he went to the US to meet his inspiration Mr. Warren Buffet. Here he made a point to study all the letters Buffett wrote to his company Berkshire Hathway. Until this point, he held 225 stocks in his portfolio which he later scaled down to just 15 stocks. Eventually, by the year 2000, his portfolio grew to Rs 100 crore.
Some of his notable and early investments were Hero Honda, Infosys, and Eicher Motors. Along with Ram K. Piparia, he co-authored the book Corporate Numbers Game in 1986. The Art of Wealth Creation is another book by him that is highly recommended by our team.
5. Vijay Kedia
Dr. Vijay Kishanlal Kedia ranks in the fifth spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Dr. Vijay Kishanlal Kedia is an Indian investor trader born in Kolkata and has been involved in the market since he was 19.
Kedia and his company “Kedia Securities Pvt. Ltd.” are the largest shareholders in several listed companies. Vijay Kedia was born into a Marwari family of stockbrokers. His family has already had a background in the stock market for decades.
Because of his devotion, he had always wanted to join the Army. But fate has its own plans, and Vijay’s father’s passing was the biggest turning point for the Kedia family. To manage the family, he took over the brokerage and trading business of his family.
Vijay believes that an investor must have three qualities: Knowledge, Courage, and Patience. In 2016 Kedia was featured at #13 in the Business World list of Successful Investors In India. In 2017 “MoneyLife Advisory” launched an “Ask Vijay Kedia” microsite as well.
Kedia strictly adheres to SMILE as a principle in investing; which translates into- Small in size, Medium in experience, Large in aspiration, and Extra-large in market potential
6. Porinju Veliyath
Porinju Veliyath ranks in the sixth spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Porinju Veliyath is a Kochi, Kerala-based investor and founder of the portfolio management firm Equity Intelligence India Private Ltd.
He manages his private portfolio along with that of other investors with his PMS scheme. This PMS house was established by Mr. Porinju Veliyath in the year 2001. He has been called a “small-cap czar” by The Economic Times and publicly holds 18 stocks with a net worth of over ₹189.8 Crores.
His inspiring story goes back to his teens. Veliyath comes from a family that is lower middle class. His early life was filled with obstacles, which is what shaped him to be who he is now. His family had gone through deep financial crises when he was only 16 years of age. The condition was so vulnerable that they had to sell off their homes to repay the debts.
At a very young age, Porinju Veliyath decided to do a job to support his family and joined as an accountant in a small firm. His salary was a mere ₹1000. This was such a meager amount that he was unable to fulfill the basic amenities of his family and hence he decided to seek another job.
He joined Ernakulam Telephone Exchange at a salary of ₹2,500. Porinju didn’t leave his study while working. He completed his study in law, and after receiving a degree, he began seeking a better job. However, he was unable to find the right job for a few months.
Subsequently, he moved to Mumbai in the year 1990 where he started his career as a floor trader with Kotak Securities. Later he joined Parag Parikh Securities, where is worked from 1994 to 1999 as a research analyst.
After 1999, he moved back to his hometown in Kochi and in 2002 founded a portfolio management company. He manages his portfolio and offers investment advice to other investors. He successfully invested in companies that other investors avoided.
During the stock market bull run between 2013 and 2018, his portfolio gained exponentially through his investment in multi-baggers. Veliyath is known especially for his ability to pick small-cap company stocks with strong business potential.
For example, one of his first investments was Geojit Financial Service, a bad penny stock then. But he remained confident with his investment decision. It later proved to be a multi-bagger stock, generating a multifold return.
After that, Veliyath’s investment in Shreyas Shipping was yet another financial success. His stock selection reveals a lot about his approach to investing. He has a talent for looking beyond the present and foreseeing the future.
7. Nemish Shah
Mr. Nemish Shah ranks in the seventh spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Mr. Nemish Shah is the Co-Founder of ENAM, one of the most reputed and respectable investment houses in India.
He started his stock venture in the year 1984 around that time he also founded his company ENAM Holding. After a few years, he expanded his stock investment in the banking sector.
Within 6 months his firm became the top listers of the investment banks. He is also known as the man who took Infosys (#INFY) public in the year 1993. At the time of issuance, the shares of Infosys were under-subscribed.
Nemish Shah and Vallabh Bhansali, co-founders of ENAM, had to convince people to invest in Infosys. He earned a B.Com from Lala Lajpat Rai College, Mumbai University in 1977.
A man of great fundamentals, he is viewed as a deeply spiritual person. His peers reckon that it is this element of spirituality that has helped bring about an element of balance to his investment strategy.
He is an avid reader of Jain scriptures and likes to unwind by watching cricket or listening to music. According to an analysis, he shows personal interest in investing in old traditional-driven companies rather than new-aged establishments. In 2010, ENAM merged its investment banking and broking operations with Axis Bank in a deal valued at ₹2,067 crores.
At present, Shah manages the firm’s treasury operations and is focused on growing its proprietary capital, under ENAM Holding Pvt Ltd.
8. Anil Kumar Goel
Anil Kumar Goel ranks in the 8th spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Anil Kumar Goel is one of Dalal Street’s popular investors and is known for his affection for micro and small businesses.
Anil Kumar who is now 62, has been trading since his college days and displays the potential to churn out big gains from the small and micro businesses stock which are rare to find with big investors. In the late 1960s, he started assisting his grandfather in his steel trading business which was then flourishing at a tremendous speed.
He said in some of his media interviews that it used to amuse him and he was very excited about being able to handle lakhs of rupees from a such young age when his friends were singing Beatles in college.
In the 90s he started participating in the market and tested the market for the first time when the market was going down in the year 1991-1992. He invested a hefty sum of ₹50 lakhs in September 1992 and then in 1993, the market fell further and his family asked him to get out of the market which he didn’t listen to.
His anticipation was proved right when the market turned around in the year 1994 beginning, and the investment he made in 1993 which was ₹5 crores, turned into ₹20 crores. After going through a lot of ups and downs and also leaving the market for quite a long time, he entered the market again in the year 1998, and then his journey from there started again and he bought IT stocks which were the new sensation back then.
He does his financial analysis and invests in the stocks of the companies accordingly. That proves wrong at times as well but he never stops as he has great instinctive power for the businesses. He started buying stocks in tiny and microbusiness businesses in the latter years.
9. Akash Bhansali
Akash Bhansali ranks in the 9th spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Akash Bhansali is one of the whiz investors of Dalal Street and he is quite popular for his stock-picking and portfolio management skills.
His investing strategy is relatively simple and tests his confidence and conviction. Mr. Bhanshali leads the principal investments unit for ENAM. He is recognized for his knack for identifying the potential of mid-size businesses and providing the capital and expertise to scale.
Mr. Bhanshali has identified and invested in business leaders across numerous industries who have turned their companies into sector icons. He has a Master’s in Commerce and is a certified chartered accountant, making him a qualified professional.
Akash Bhansali started with the stock market with a few rules set in his head that he follows very rigidly. This is why he is witnessing continuous growth in the portfolio he holds.
He is very particular about choosing the sectors. He has no or only one stock in the IT sector and if has IT stocks in his portfolio then he does not hold Pharma stocks and Private sector Bank stocks.
It is a unique rule that he applies which not many of the investors follow but there are some like Dolly Khanna who also follow the ‘No IT’; ‘No Pharma’ stocks rule. He follows the balanced diversification rule in his portfolio and has not held more than 20 stocks in his portfolio most of the time. At present, he holds 18 stocks of different companies from different sectors.
He invests in only one company per sector.
Akash Bhansali is not a traditional investor and he puts money into the unique and rare business as well where many pro investors don’t want to take a dig. For example, the Laminate market is a pretty novice in the stock market and there are hardly a few stocks in this sector listed on the exchange.
Greenlam Laminates (#GREENLAM) is one such contrarian stock that he currently owns.
10. Dolly and Rajeev Khanna
Perhaps the most interesting one, Dolly / Rajeev Khanna ranks in the 10th spot on this list of top 10 Indian investors. Dolly / Rajeev Khanna is a Chennai-based large investor couple, who is known for lesser-known picks that tend to go on to over-perform in the stock market.
Rajiv Khanna is the brain behind Dolly Khanna’s multi-bagger portfolio. He is one of the most successful stock investors on Dalal Street. This Chennai-based investor has a talent for identifying quality stocks at the right time and bagging stellar returns.
Khanna, along with his wife, has generated an enormous amount of wealth from the stock market. Mr. Khanna, born and brought up in a middle-class family in Chennai, had his fair share of struggles in early life before becoming a top individual investor on Dalal Street.
Rajiv graduated as a chemical engineer from IIT, Madras. Later in 1986, he started his venture called Kwality Milk Foods, an ice cream business, which he sold to Hindustan Unilever in 1995.
He has been investing in the stock markets since 1996 and calls himself an accidental investor. In one of the videos available on YouTube, he can be seen telling IIT Madras students that he knew nothing about investing and used to invest in fixed deposits and certificates of deposit.
When he sold his company to HUL, he had no idea where to invest his money. His neighbor’s son was working with Satyam computers so he casually decided to invest in the company from 1996 to 1997.
Satyam was making a killing in the stock market back then, and this inspired him to invest heavily in tech stocks. Oblivious to the fact that the valuations were sky-high, the 2000 crash came across as a wake-up call where surprisingly he didn’t go bust but rather made gains over 300 percent.
This episode intrigued him to study the markets and this is how he came to be an ace investor. His turning point came when he was looking to buy a flat in Delhi in 2003-2004 and stumbled upon Unitech, a realty company. Impressed by the business, he invested ₹5-7 lakh into the stock and decided to forget about it.
In 2008, as the realty boom came, my petty investment of ₹5-7 lakh in Unitech turned ₹25 crores he says in the video.
As a humble person, Khanna attributes his success to not only merit but some amount of luck as well.
“If I started with ₹6, it is now worth ₹2,000 at a mind-boggling CAGR. Do I have the capacity to do so? I do not think so. It was a bit of luck, a bit of everything, he says.”
Downplaying his achievements, he says he did not deserve such adoration — “People put me on a pedestal and keep writing about my portfolio. I was far too stupid to not know when to sell a stock and it went on to become a multi-bagger”
Dolly Khanna’s portfolio typically leans towards more traditional stocks in manufacturing, textile, chemicals, and sugar stocks.
Conclusion
The mainstream media frequently embellishes stock market success stories with rags-to-riches tales. This leads a lot of inexperienced investors to believe that investing is just a game of speculation.
We can conclude that success in the stock markets is not only a matter of chance after carefully reviewing the anecdotes of the brightest minds around here. Most retail bettors don’t seem to find long-term success by pursuing or imitating their picks and portfolios in a militaristic manner.
Instead, there are a few unique factors that can be seen clearly that are worth noting down to be successful.
☑ The majority of successful Indian investors come from backgrounds or situations that have given them incisive cognitive conditioning and deadly survival abilities to overcome obstacles.
☑ Many successful investors had excellent mentors in their families who helped them along the way (fathers and grandfathers)
☑ Most successful investors were backed by considerable capital in their formation years
☑ They demonstrate a deeper knowledge of how to effectively use leverage (borrowed money)
☑ The majority of the investors on our list have professional degrees from respectable institutions that have aided them in understanding the fundamentals of investing.
☑ They are good at innovating a concept such as a business or a firm
☑ They invest with credence that’s backed by numerical analysis, common sense, and above-average IQs
This finishes our ranking of the Top 10 Indian Investors. Please feel free to comment if you feel that we have left out any investors who you think should be listed here.
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1 Comment
Motivating collection of super investors. Nice read.