Within minutes of Parliament approving higher foreign investment in the insurance sector, a number of insurers, including from Bharti, Reliance, Max India and SBI groups, said their overseas partners would raise their stakes in their respective joint ventures to 49 per cent. Bharti Enterprises and AXA have a 74:26 joint venture with Bharti holding the majority stake. The entity offers life and general insurance.
“We can confirm that AXA will step up their equity investment to 49 per cent. Bharti will soon move the application to the Foreign Investment Promotion Board as per the new foreign direct investment guidelines,” Bharti Enterprises Chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal said in a statement.
Bharti and AXA remain fully committed to their insurance joint ventures, he added.
Reliance Capital said it would soon begin talks with foreign partners for its insurance ventures. Besides giving additional stake to its existing foreign partner Nippon Life in the life insurance venture, the group also expects to close deals for bringing in new partners for its general and health insurance businesses soon.
“We will be initiating dialogue with our partners in life insurance for increasing their stake and also hope to close the partners for our general insurance and health insurance businesses soon,” company CEO Sam Ghosh told PTI Reliance Capital’s unit Reliance Life Insurance already has Japan’s Nippon Life as a foreign partner with 26 per cent stake, which has earlier said it was to hike its stake to 49 per cent as and when the law permited.
SBI Life, a joint venture between State Bank of India and BNP Paribas Cardiff, is in talks with the foreign partner for raising the stake.
“They are interested in hiking the stake. How much and when it happens will depend on discussions,” SBI Life MD and CEO Arijit Basu said.
Max India Chairman Analjit Singh said its joint venture partner in health insurance venture, U.K.-based Bupa, was willing to hike stake in the company, and a proposal in this regard was pending with the FIPB. As regards Max Life Insurance, Mr. Singh said, “Lots of conversation is going on with multiple partners. If Mitsui wants to raise stake, that is Mitsui’s call.''
Insurance stocks in limelightEarlier in the day, shares of corporates with interest in insurance business witnessed hectic buying in anticipation of the Insurance Bill clearing the Rajya Sabha hurdle. Reliance Capital led the rally with 10.92 per cent gain to end at Rs. 489.95. — PTI
