True Beacon

About  

Building on co-founder Nikhil Kamath’s capital market expertise and track record (building the largest stockbroking platform Zerodha), True Beacon was established in early 2019 to change the way UHNI and HNI build wealth.

The company is built on client alignment through a zero-standing-fee model, a conservative investment approach, together with liquidity and techenabled transparency. True Beacon serves several hundred sophisticated domestic Indian and global clients who want to capture India’s economic and equity market growth. True Beacon One, a SEBI-regulated Fund, was launched in September 2019 and returned an absolute performance of 47.2% in 2020, beating the NIFTY50, the index of the largest 50 companies in India, by 32.3%.

Key staff 

Nikhil Kamath, CIO and CO-Founder, True Beacon and Zerodha – Nikhil’s passion for analytics and financial markets stems from his unorthodox childhood. He dropped out of school at 14 to play chess for the country, and started equity trading at 17. He focused on developing alternative investment strategies and co-founded Kamath Associates at the age of 19 to manage HNW Individuals. He co-founded Zerodha with his brother Nithin in 2010 and in August 2019, Nikhil cofounded True Beacon to bring his Fund management experience to a global group of Ultra High Net Worth strategic investors, and now focuses full-time on managing the Fund.

Richard Pattle LVO, CEO AND CO-Founder True Beacon, Senior Advisor Zerodha – Richard spent 18 years as a battlefield helicopter pilot in the British Royal Air Force, before becoming Master of the Household of Their Royal Highnesses. The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall, a COO role, over a 10 year period. From 2014 he was Vice Chairman of Standard Chartered Private Bank globally, covering Ultra High Net Worth Families for 4 years. He has been travelling and living in India for 30 years, including on exchange with the Indian Armed Forces and as the CEO of an Indian holding company.

Nithin Kamath, Co-Founder, True Beacon and Zerodha – Nithin was a prop trader, stock advisor, and sub-broker before co-founding Zerodha in 2010. As the CEO, he led Zerodha’s growth to be the largest brokerage firm in India within ten years, executing over 15% of exchange trading volumes. He also runs Rainmatter, a VC Fund, and incubator, partnering with innovative startups that are helping grow the Indian capital market ecosystem. He also sits on various advisory committees of the SEBI and various Indian stock exchanges.

Investment philosophy

True Beacon Global takes a long-term, defensive approach to investing. The top 50 Indian stocks have returned an average of 10% per annum since 2011. The Fund aims to outperform benchmark returns by at least 6% per annum post-tax over a multi-year period by employing a dynamic hybrid long only and long-short portfolio.

Analyst questions

Do you make cash calls? Which factors govern these decisions.

How do you ensure diligence of the entire fund allocation process?

What financial parameters you use for the classification?

Prepared by Arpita Alawadhi, May 2021