4 CLSA executives join India Info

Intense competition for hiring top talent continues for India's booming financial services companies with domestic brokerage India Infoline poaching four senior executives of global investment banking and brokerage service provider CLSA.

Bharat Parajia, head of sales CLSA Singapore, H Nemkumar, country head CLSA India, Vasudev Jagannath, head of sales CLSA India and Aniruddha Dange, head of research, CLSA India have resigned from their present responsibilities and would be joining India Infoline soon, said a company official.

India Infoline's aggressive hiring comes after similar aggressive recruitment by other investment banks in recent weeks.

Last week alone, JP Morgan poached executives from DSP Merrill, Lehman Brothers, Enam Financial and ICICI, while Citibank poached another executive from DSP Merrill Lynch.

In its communication to the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), India Infoline said it will be issuing a total of 90 lakh preferential equity warrants at Rs 440 each to these CLSA executives, of which 25,00,000 would be alloted to Parajia and Nemkumar each while Jagannath and Dange would get 20,00,000 each.

India Infoline has aggressive plans for expanding its international business and also wants to increase its market share in the investment banking and institutional equities business.

The hiring of new team would benefit these objectives, as Bharat Parajia, is based in Singapore would join the Mumbai team.

Meanwhile, the board of India Infoline met today and approved a proposal to raise Rs 484 crore by way of preferential issue of 1.1 crore equity warrants to promoters and institutional investors at Rs 440 each.

The brokerage will allot 13.11 lakh warrants to its promoters Nirmal Jain and R Venkatraman (3.70 lakh warrants). Khattar Holdings Pvt Ltd will also be given 3.18 lakh warrants.

A week ago leading investment bank JP Morgan poached six new members for its equity and sales team from its rival firms such as Lehman Brothers, DSP Merrill and ICICI.

JP Morgan is expanding its equity business in India and is in negotiations with few other top executives for hiring.