Rajiv Jain-led GQG’s $10 billion India bet has winning picks beyond Adani

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BSE Sensex. The largest fund, GQG Partners Emerging Markets Equity Fund, bought JSW Energy Ltd., Patanjali Foods Ltd., Macrotech Developers Ltd., Max Healthcare Institute Ltd. and IDFC First Bank Ltd.

for the first time between April and September this year. It added ITC Ltd. — the fund’s largest bet — and State Bank of India Ltd.

among other stocks, filings show. The fund last week bought 92.6 million shares in GMR Airports Infrastructure Ltd., which climbed 6.1% on Monday pushing the full year jump to 84%. It also exited its holdings in Reliance Industries Ltd., Infosys Ltd., Cipla Ltd.

and Bajaj Finserv Ltd. All of these have underperformed against the Sensex in 2023. A representative for GQG declined to comment on an emailed query seeking comments on their India investment strategy.

Jain, who was born in India but moved to the US in 1990 for his MBA, co-founded GQG Partners in 2016 and has built it into a $113 billion powerhouse since. Unlike many of his peers, Jain doesn’t have a account on X, formerly known as Twitter, makes rare TV appearances and has little penchant for driverless-car companies or hypersonic-missile manufacturers. Instead, he buys into industries with a decidedly 20th-century feel: energy, tobacco, banking.

GQG’s India stocks portfolio also mirrors this. In a June interview with Bloomberg, Jain said his firm plans to buy more of India stocks and downplayed the corporate governance and political risks that were weighing down the Adani Group. A total of nine GQG funds, that includes mutual funds, collective investments and managed funds, had investments worth $14.5 billion in India as of October end, or about 20% of their total assets under management, according to a Bloomberg analysis of filings.