Kotak Investment Banking bags Four International Awards

Mumbai: Kotak Investment Banking, the investment banking joint venture between Kotak Mahindra Bank and Goldman Sachs, has won four international awards in recent weeks, underpinning its reputation as India''s leading investment bank.

The awards and rankings are:

• Best Investment Bank in India by Global Finance
  
• Best Investment Bank in India by Finance Asia
  
• Best Equity House in India by Euromoney
  
• Best Domestic Equity House by Asiamoney

Of the Rs17,700 crore raised by Indian companies from the equity capital markets from June last year till now, the highest ever, Kotak Investment Banking has garnered a share of 84.7 per cent.

The house handled a variety of transactions that cut across various sectors, including biotech, technology, energy, automobiles, chemicals, banking and media. In March this year, Kotak Investment Banking led the largest-ever Indian equity offering: the Indian government''s Rs10,690 crore offer for the sale of its part holding in Oil and Natural Gas Corporation. Demand was overwhelming with more than Rs60,000 crore of orders received. The success of the ONGC offering clearly underlines Kotak Investment Banking''s leadership in successfully executing global-sized transactions.

Kotak Investment Banking also acted as joint global coordinator and bookrunner for the $100million FCCB of Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd, the first time that an Indian investment banking group has led an equity / equity-linked listing on an overseas exchange.

Kotak Investment Banking has also been ranked number one in mergers and acquisitions by Bloomberg, the global financial information giant, for the period January -June 2004.

Commenting on the awards, Ajay Sondhi, vice chairman and managing director of Kotak Investment Banking, said, "These awards recognise our performance that has been enabled by the trust and confidence that our clients repose in us and our team. We are strongly encouraged by this recognition to continue to build India''s first truly global investment bank."