AIF investments swell by 90% to Rs 750 billion in June quarter

Capital put in by alternative investment funds (AIFs) rose to nearly Rs 750 billion at the end of the April-June quarter, a surge of 90 per cent from the year-ago period.

AIFs are a class of pooled-in vehicles for investing in real estate, private equity and hedge funds and over 270 such funds are registered with Sebi since 2012.

The investment made by AIFs stood at Rs 748.93 billion during the three months ended June, much higher than the Rs 393 billion invested in the same quarter last year, according to latest data available with Sebi. At the end of March quarter, capital infused by AIFs was at Rs 614 billion.

Category-I AIFs poured in Rs 89.5 billion, category-II Rs 417.1 billion, and category-III Rs 242.3 billion.  At the end of December 2012, they pumped in just Rs 2 million, which has now jumped to close to Rs 750 billion.

AIFs are funds established in India pooling in capital from Indian and foreign investors for investing according to a pre-decided policy.
 
Under the Sebi guidelines, AIFs can operate broadly in three categories.

The category-I AIFs are those funds that get incentives from the government and regulators and include social venture, infrastructure and venture capital funds.

The category-III AIFs are those trading with a view to making short-term returns and include hedge funds. The category-II AIFs can invest anywhere in any combination, but are prohibited from raising debt, except for meeting their day-to-day operational requirements. These AIFs include private equity and debt funds or fund of funds.