Russia ready to help India in setting up sovereign wealth fund

By
Daily Excelsior
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NEW DELHI, Dec 30: Russia has expressed willingness to help India in setting up a sovereign wealth fund.
The chief of the USD 10 billion-Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) said it would be a good idea for India to have a sovereign wealth fund.
“Generally, we believe that India has quite a bit of potential if it were to set up a sovereign wealth fund because India is a huge economy with tremendous promise and we need to allocate capital, within and outside India, through partnerships, which we believe would be a good idea,” RDIF Chief Executive Officer Kirill Dmitriev told recently.
On whether RDIF would help India in setting up a sovereign wealth fund, he said, it would be ready to help.
Though there have been talks of India looking to set up a sovereign wealth fund, there is no concrete proposal as yet.
A sovereign wealth fund (SWF) is a state-owned investment fund composed of financial assets.
According to him, it makes “sense” to even look at a common fund for the BRICS—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
“I think we can think about a common fund for BRICS. It makes sense… I think it will come overtime,” he said.
“We should be pragmatic. Rather, it should be joint funds between different BRIC countries. BRICS are going to play more and more important role going forward. Joint investments between BRICS countries is really important,” he said.
On December 24, RDIF entered into a pact with country’s largest public sector lender State Bank of India (SBI) for setting up a USD 2 billion co-investment consortium. The fund, in which both parties would pump in USD 1 billion each, would look at promoting mutual investments between the two nations.
The pact was inked as part of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to India.
Meanwhile, RDIF already has investment partnerships with China and Kuwait, among others.
Dmitriev said that RDIF has already brought in investment proposals to the tune of USD 2.6 billion so far in 2012.
“About USD 12 billion worth new projects are being looked at right now, including opportunities in India,” he added. (PTI)

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