The AI Book

CHAPTER 36AI in Indian Investment and Asset Management: Global Perspective

By Nilesh Gopali¹

¹International Business Advisor and Strategic Investments

and Hasik Shetty²

²Machine Learning Engineer and Strategist

India is at a watershed moment with digital explosion and highest economic growth (5–6%) across the world. This has created an emerging middle class with disposable income.

A huge market exists to use AI in the investment management space which is driven by a young population (65% of the population below the age of 35 years), new high-net-worth individuals and significant dead cash with just 18 million investors (around 2% of the population).

Key drivers of the Indian market:

• JAM (Jan Dhan Aadhar Mobile) Trinity: An Indian government initiative which opened 320 million bank accounts post-2014 for low income groups, contributing towards financial inclusion. Bank accounts were opened with the new biometric identification, the Aadhar card.
• Digital India: The Digitization boom in India helped India overtake the US to become the second largest smartphone market, with the cheapest mobile data pack globally.
• Post demonetization (Nov 2016), there has been a significant shift of monies from physical assets to financial assets. The major beneficiary is the mutual funds asset class, which has seen huge inflow.

Inherent Issues in India

The high-net-worth individual (HNWI) end of the market is covered by financial institutions, whilst the investing needs of the emerging middle ...