Investment banking fees up 6% in 2019 over higher fees in debt segment

The country's investment banking fees rose 5.8 per cent to $783.5 million in the first nine months of 2019, from the year-ago period, led by higher fees in the debt segment, according to a report by Refinitiv.

Debt capital market underwriting fees totalled $201.2 million, up 108.7 per cent from a year ago — the best-ever first three quarters since records began in 2000.

Equity capital market (ECM) underwriting fees stood at $134.2 million, a 4.7 per cent decrease from the same period last year.

Syndicated lending fees fell 5.2 per cent from the comparative period last year and generated $209.9 million. Merger and acquisition (M&A) advisory fees were down 15.6 per cent to $238.2 million, from the record high set a year ago.

Axis Bank took the top spot in India’s investment banking fee league table, with 9.6 per cent market share and $75.5 million in related fees.

ICICI Bank was second, with an 8.4 per cent market share.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch leads the ranking for ECM underwriting, with $1.9 billion in fees and 11 per cent market share, followed by Morgan Stanley, with 10.5 per cent share.

The ECM segment has seen a mop-up of $17.4 billion this year, up 23.3 per cent from the comparable period in 2018. Initial public offerings totalled $2.2 billion, down 49.3 per cent from a robust period last year.

Rights offerings raised $7.4 billion to date and accounted for 42.4 per cent of India’s ECM proceeds, after two of India’s biggest rights offering on record priced this year — Vodafone Idea’s $3.6-billion and Bharti Airtel’s $3.5-billion issuances.

Primary bond offerings from India-domiciled issuers hit record high and totalled $66.7 billion during the first nine months of 2019, a 104.4 per cent increase in proceeds from a year ago.

India announced M&A activity is at $61.2 billion so far this year, a 46.1 per cent year-on-year decline after witnessing a record first nine months period last year. Target India M&A stood at $57 billion, down 42.7 per cent from the same period last year.

The largest India-targeted deal so far this year is Brookfield Asset Management’s $3.7 billion (~252.2 billion) acquisition of Reliance Industries’ tower infrastructure trust.