Blackstone, one of world’s largest private equity (PE) majors, is bullish to invest in India inspite of the economic slowdown in the country.
Blackstone has identified “stressed assets” and warehousing as the new areas of investment, besides focus on technology and real estate, according to its chairman, CEO and co-founder Stephen A. Schwarzman.
Hinting at buying stressed assets, Mr. Schwarzman said, “Issues with India are more about slowing economic growth and limited credit extension by the banking system and neo banks, and that should create more need for owners of companies to look for other sources of liquidity. For us, if there is something very attractive here... we’ve a lot of long term confidence in India. So, we will be very active buyers or lenders in this market.”
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Blackstone has so far invested over $15 billion in India since it started Indian operations in 2006. Most of its investments includes PE play in enterprises, and bets on realty, of late. “Blackstone India will be focussing on the real estate sector to create spaces that can be hired by IT companies and also warehousing space going forward,” Schwarzman said.
To a query by The Hindu , Mr. Schwarzman declined to comment if he will play the role of a negotiator in the U.S. - India trade deal. Mr. Schwarzman played a key role of a negotiator in the U.S. -China trade deal. Mr. Schwarzman is not happy with the liquidity crisis in the Indian banking system and wants Indian banks to follow the U.S. model.
When asked about the impact of COVID-19, Mr. Schwarzman said that the pandemic was a black swan event globally and flagged risks to companies’ profits.
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