BCC&I organized the Wealth Management Summit 2013 on 10th of December at The Park, which was a first-of-its-kind initiative of the Bengal Chamber in the Financial Sector. Almost all the key industry players of the fund houses and key leaders from banking and other non banking financial corporations were present.

Eminent speakers included Ms. Soma Majumder, General Manager, Securities and Exchange Board of India; Mr. Sundeep Sikka, President & CEO, Reliance Capital Asset Management Ltd; Mr. Dinesh Khara, MD & CEO, SBI Funds Management Pvt. Ltd.; Mr. A Balasubramanian, CEO, Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund; Mr. Nimesh Shah, MD & CEO, ICICI Prudential Asset Management Co. Ltd.; Mr. Sandesh Kirkire, CEO, Kotak Mutual Fund; Mr. Ajit Menon, Executive Vice President, Head of Sales & Co Head- Marketing, DSP BlackRock Investment Managers Pvt. Ltd.; Mr. Nilesh Shah, CEO, Axis Capital Limited; Mr. Ritesh Jain – Chief Investment Officer, Tata Asset Management Company Limited; Mr. Ajay Bagga, Head - Private Wealth Management, Deutsche Bank and Mr. Shantanu Ambedkar, Managing Director & Head of Private Banking, HSBC India.

The Opening Session focused on the Role of Fund Houses in sustaining and growing investors’ wealth. Financial Asset products that are available in the market have grown in spectrum. New products like preference shares / inflation index bonds / tax free bonds / NBFC Debenture etc. have come into prominence. It is important to understand how the Mutual Fund Industry is reinventing itself in this background of sector evolution. The industry has also received guidance from the Regulator which has contributed to its growth over the years at an astounding pace on all parameters and now SEBI Amendment Bill is coming up and we would expect the regulatory measures would be instrumental towards further growth of the industry. Alternate managers like broking firms, portfolio managers, banks etc are interacting and trying to garner mind space of investors. Direct investor interaction with Mutual Funds has recently been incentivized through introduction of Direct Schemes. It is also important to understand how Mutual Fund scores over the alternate mangers and the steps that are being taken by Fund Houses to enhance their interaction with the end investors for the same.

Session II focused on technical analysis of various asset classes and their mutual significance. Speakers spoke about proper investor awareness as a number of ponzi scams had already shaken the industry, regulator and investors. They also discussed about the correct period of holding a fund and that even selection of a fund or scheme varies from person to person. There is no mathematical formula to get into a win-win situation. If any scheme shows enormous profit there must be something wrong in it. However, Indian investors have a false liquidity inclination rather to savings which is again detrimental towards the individual investor as well as the companies.