Dear Sheru,

I trust you and your family are safe and keeping good health. Active COVID-19 cases are still being reported from across the country. What’s more, with the onset of the monsoon season, the number of Coronavirus infections and other viral infections are on the rise. In Sharekhan we have three COVID active cases at present and I wish these Sherus a speedy recovery. To avoid falling sick continue to follow COVID-appropriate behaviour at home and outside both. Sharekhan continues to work in hybrid mode in the Head Office with the staff being allowed to work from office subject to approvals. All our branches remain open and there is no restriction on attendance. All staff who are working from office are following all COVID protocols. We continue to monitor the situation closely and will keep you updated about any new developments.

Here is a quick update on what is happening on the Vision 2025 front.

After closing down for three months in a row, the equity market recovered in July 2022. Along with it recovered our performance.

• The equity market bounced back in July with Sensex and Nifty rising by more than 8.5% each.
• Our daily average revenue grew by 7% MoM in July 2022.
• Our cash market share and futures & options market share grew by 3% and 5% respectively in July 2022.
• We saw a 3% growth MoM in the daily client activity in the last month.
• The trailing 12-month active clients count reached 768,940 by the end of July 2022. This was a new all-time high for Sharekhan for this metric.
• Close to 13.3K branch-mapped broking clients were reactivated as part of the Mission Reconnect Programme in the last month.
• Our MF AUM grew by 7.7% MoM in July this year despite operational headwinds.
• We launched an internal communication campaign on Vision 2025 with a series of well-made videos in July 2022.
• Sharekhan rolled out a branded, professionally designed cohesive e-mail signature for all its staff last month.
• Sales FOS was added to the portfolio of the Chief Business Officer Parminder Varma with effect from July 1, 2022 as part of a portfolio reshuffle.
• Sharekhan offered to reimburse Sherus for the expenses incurred to receive a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine for themselves and their immediate family members.
• The APAC Fundraising Campaign 2022, which ended on July 31, 2022, generated a total sum of Rs.10,49,255 from 1,908 unique staff of Sharekhan.

After falling for three consecutive months, the Indian equity market bounced back in July this year. The benchmark indices Nifty and Sensex rose by 8.7% and 8.6% month on month (MoM) respectively last month as foreign portfolio investors returned as net buyers of Indian equities after a long period of nine months. As the domestic equity market recovered, our daily average revenue increased by 7% MoM in July with the daily client activity going up by 3% MoM in the same period. Our market share in the cash and futures & options segments of the equity market grew by 3% and 5% MoM respectively during the month. Our cash market turnover grew at by 9% MoM in July this year, at a faster clip compared with the 5% growth in the equity market turnover in the same period. On the negative side, the new client additions dropped for the second month in succession, closing down 6% MoM for the month. The business environment is looking promising again. The festive season is around the corner and sales of consumer goods typically increase during festivals, causing the consumption-driven companies to give better returns. Let us help customers create wealth in the months ahead.

The Mission Reconnect Programme (MRP) had another positive growth month in July this year. The trailing 12-month (TTM) active client count stood at 7,68,940 at the end of July 2022. This is a new all-time high in Sharekhan for this metric. The MRP facilitated the reactivation of almost 13.3K branch-mapped clients during the month. What’s more, the efforts of the Business Partners resulted in the reactivation of another 2.8K clients in the same period.

The trend remains that reactivations are also good for revenue growth. Close to 2.5% of the clients who got reactivated in July have also traded in futures & options already. Also, a large proportion of the reactivations have continued beyond just one or two transactions. Almost 19% of the reactivations that took place in July have conducted three or more transactions already.

My best wishes to the entire front-line team as well as our Business Partners for the continued success. Let’s aim and plan to take this programme to newer heights.

Our MF AUM rose by 7.7% MoM in July this year to Rs.6,148 crore, reflecting the gains in the broader equity market (the Nifty was up 8.7% in July 2022). The gross inflow for the month stood at Rs.83.75 crore and the net collection was negative at Rs.19.73 crore. The inflows into Systematic Investment Plans (SIP) declined sharply by 20% MoM in the same period to Rs.47.69 crore. The SIP inflows fell due to issues faced by the MF industry on account of regulatory changes related to non-pooling of funds and subsequent migration of our back-office operations to BSE StAR MF, the electronic platform of the BSE for allotment and redemption of mutual funds.

Our Exchange Margin Funding (EMF) business contracted by 7% MoM in July this year. We closed the month with EMF AUM of Rs.850 crore. Our Branch Network contributed almost 66% of the total funding that took place last month. Our Business Partners accounted for the balance.

Our Loan Against Securities (LAS) book grew by 0.57% MoM in July 2022. Our total disbursements contracted by 50% MoM in the same period mainly on account of a temporary hold on fresh disbursals for the existing corporate clients. Corporate clients account for a big chunk of our total monthly disbursals. We achieved total disbursements of Rs.192.60 crore during the month.

Channelwise break-up of LAS disbursements in July 2022

Under a portfolio reshuffling exercise carried out last month, Sales FOS was added to the portfolio of Parminder Varma, Director and Chief Business Officer (CBO), with effect from July 1, 2022. The function was earlier reporting to Jean-Christophe Gougeon, Director and Chief Marketing Officer. With the reshuffle, the entire front-line staff of the company started to report to the CBO. Additionally, following the exit of Geeta Ramesh, her direct reportees in the Sales FOS team report to the CBO until a new Client Acquisition Head is recruited.

The APAC Fundraising Campaign 2022, which had started on April 27 this year, ended on July 31, 2022 on a successful note. The fundraiser collected a total amount of Rs.10,49,255 from 1,908 unique staff of Sharekhan. As many as 1,320 full-time employees and 588 contractual staff participated in the three-month-long fundraiser and donated either salary or leave or both as part of their corporate social responsibility (CSR). I thank the Sherus who made the fundraiser successful by supporting the cause and donating generously. I also appreciate the efforts of the CSR team as well as various Business Heads to organise various fundraising activities and webinars to encourage Sherus to participate in the CSR activity.

In keeping with our continuous efforts to adopt the best practices of corporate branding and communications, on July 19, 2022, we rolled out a branded, professionally designed cohesive e-mail signature for the staff of Sharekhan to be used in all internal and external communications. The e-mail signature, designed by the IC team, was customised to include an escalation clause for the front-line staff and the respective customer segment logos for the segment staff. The e-mail signature was designed keeping in mind the company’s colour palette and overall aesthetic to boost brand awareness. The idea is to have a uniform e-mail signature as far as possible across the organisation. I hope you have adopted the e-mail signature applicable to your team. Your e-mail signature is very much like your business card, besides offering your contact details to the recipient, it shows your company’s personality. We are in the process of rolling out an updated and improved version of the e-mail signature soon. Watch out for it and do update your e-mail signature whenever the upgrade is released.

Last month, we also rolled out a policy to reimburse all Sharekhan staff for expenses incurred in receiving a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine. The facility is available to all active staff of Sharekhan, including those on roll, expats, retainers and third-party staff on Quess Corp Limited and Randstad India Private Limited, who have received a booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine privately by paying for the vaccine themselves. The staff can also apply for reimbursement of the expenses incurred by them on account of the vaccination of their spouse, parents and children (up to three dependents). The reimbursements can be obtained after submitting relevant documents via e-mail.

The Coronavirus is very much around and COVID-19 cases are rising again. So you must continue to follow the basic precautions. Maintain social distancing, wear a mask when in crowd, wash your hands frequently, keep rooms well-ventilated and cough away from others into your elbow to stay safe. If you still have not vaccinated yourself against COVID-19, we encourage you to get yourself vaccinated as soon as possible, as vaccination can help protect you from getting the disease. Besides, some state governments have mandated that only fully vaccinated staff should be allowed to work from office and that each staff must submit his/her final COVID-19 vaccination certificate to his/her employer. Whether one is working from office or home, each staff must, therefore, upload his/her final certificate on ShareKonnect, our Human Resource Management System. The Human Resources team has already communicated to all staff how to do it. Don’t wait, upload your final COVID-19 vaccination certificate today. Please continue to take care of yourself and your loved ones, stay safe.

Thank you.

Best regards,
Jaideep Arora
Director and Chief Executive Officer,
Sharekhan