Shyam Maheshwari – One with long-term expertise on the credit and special situation side in India

 Shyam Maheshwari was the former Chief Executive Officer, Founder and Partner of SSG Capital Management. Maheshwari who has 17 years of experience in the deal sourcing, analysis and investing industry was primarily responsible for SSG’s investment activities in India. Shyam Maheshwari holds 4 board and advisor roles including Director at Holiday break and Associate Director at Institute of Chartered Accountants of India. Shyam Maheshwari had 4 past jobs including Assistant Manager at Reliance Life Insurance. He graduated from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai and completed his MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore.

Shyam Maheshwari SSG has a long-term expertise on the credit and special situation side in India. In the vast array of financial services, ‘special situations’ conjures up something vaguely mysterious. Yet this is a fast-growing investor class whose mandate is potentially transformational: gain control of distressed or insolvent companies, typically by acquiring their non-performing loans, restructure with fresh capital and smarter management, bring out inherent value and finally exit via a sale. India’s IBC was designed to do much the same. Backed by law, they carried out an attempt to consolidate and accelerate the paths of different companies to debt resolution. But the IBC has now been suspended for new referrals for one year for recognition of the devastating impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on business activity.

 Shyam Maheshwari was the former Chief Executive Officer, Founder and Partner of SSG Capital Managemen

According to Shyam Maheshwari, India is perhaps the only emerging market in Asia that has opened the doors to foreigners to participate in the local currency debt and NPA markets. Shyam finds that under the BJP government, the reforms on IBC have been pathbreaking. All the ingredients of regulations, transparency, market access and the need for foreign capital are present here. Shyam Maheshwari recognizes that while the NPA pool has declined over the past few years with resolutions and recoveries, the demand for credit and resolution capital far outstrips the supply.

In Shyam Maheshwari’s view, from days in early 2000 very few foreign funds participated in India. But now all the foreign players are represented in India. Maheshwari identifies that the reason for the opportunities to become more appealing is mainly due to two factors. The first is due to perceptible reduction in the timeframe of recovery (due to IBC) and the second one is risk (due to market access). In contrast to this, one would struggle to have similar access in China where markets are probably multiples of that in India. A similar contrast with Indonesia is warranted where their bankruptcy law PKPU has not met success like IBC. According to Shyam Maheshwari, mid-market corporate may be the opportunity for credit while retail NPL could provide thrust to special situation opportunities.