Nahar Capital & Financial Services is the Nahar Group’s in-house investment office - a lean, conservatively run vehicle that deploys the industrial group’s capital across public and private financial markets while also renting out the property it owns. Incorporated in 2006 and led by a founding family with over six decades in textiles, the company was built to be a dedicated financial-services arm, and it still operates that way: a 20-person team in Ludhiana managing a diversified portfolio with no public deposits and no customer-facing business. The recurring approach is a “balanced” allocation philosophy - continuously reviewed, deliberately shifted toward safer and future-facing assets when markets change - which the company credits for its ability to spot early warnings and act on them.
Business segments
Two engines that work together - a diversified investment portfolio that allocates capital across public and private markets, and a real-estate rental business that turns owned property into a steady income stream.
1. Investment and credit: the group’s capital allocator
The company acts like an institutional investor, putting money to work across equities, bonds, mutual funds, and private funds, while also lending to group companies - all with a long-term, strategic bent.
- Two portfolios, two time horizons - the company formally splits its holdings into a long-term Investment Portfolio (securities held as capital assets) and a short-term Trading Portfolio, so it can pursue both patient capital gains and nearer-term opportunities.
- A deliberately wide investable universe - it can buy listed and unlisted equity shares, debt and equity mutual funds, bonds, debentures, Market Linked Debentures, REITs, InvITs, Alternative Investment Funds, venture capital and private equity funds, multi-asset and balanced funds, and credit opportunity funds, which means it is not boxed into any single asset class.
- A thesis that moved toward safety and the future - when fixed-income instruments began offering lower returns and higher defaults, the company reduced exposure to debt structures and preference shares and increased allocations to domestic equity, international equity funds, top-rated bond funds, and real-estate AIFs; more recently, it has been steering toward REITs, InvITs, next-generation PE and VC funds, and funds tied to electric vehicles, artificial intelligence, 5G/6G networking, and cloud computing.
- Run on a real-time analytics backbone - investment operations sit on SAP S4 HANA, an in-memory enterprise system that enables real-time data processing and keeps all data in the cloud, supported by a dedicated Asset Liability Management policy and an Audit Committee consisting of three Non-Executive Directors.
2. Real estate: rental income from owned property
The company owns buildings and land that it leases out for rental income, treating property as a separate, yield-generating business alongside its financial portfolio.
- A distinct segment for higher yields - real-estate activity is formally reported as a separate operating segment under accounting standards, signalling that management views it as more than a passive holding.
- Two kinds of property on the books - the portfolio includes investment property (buildings and furniture with a net block of Rs. 5,564 lakhs as of March 2021) and real estate held as inventory (valued at Rs. 2,833 lakhs on the same date), giving it both long-term rental assets and property it can sell.
- An engine the company keeps trying to grow - across multiple annual reports, the company has stated its intention to explore and invest in new real-estate projects to increase its lease and rental income, though the segment has remained a smaller contributor relative to the investment business.
Group structure and partners
The company sits at the centre of the Nahar Group as an investment vehicle with no subsidiaries of its own, but with significant stakes in two associate companies that are consolidated into its financials.
- No subsidiaries, two associates - the company has no subsidiary or joint-venture companies, but it holds significant equity in and consolidates two associates: Nahar Spinning Mills Ltd. (45.49% as of FY23) and Nahar Poly Films Ltd. (49.16% as of FY23).
- Part of a wider industrial group - related entities include Nahar Spinning Mills, Nahar Poly Films, Nahar Industrial Enterprises, Monte Carlo Fashions, and Oswal Leasing, with Nahar Polyfilms Ltd. itself holding 39.48% of the company as of FY21.
- A former associate was exited cleanly - Nahar Industrial Enterprises Ltd. ceased to be an associate during FY20 when the company sold its entire holding at market rate, showing a willingness to trim positions when appropriate.
- Top-tier short-term credit rating - the company carries an [ICRA] A1+ rating from ICRA Limited for its Rs. 25-crore short-term debt and commercial paper programme, the highest credit-quality rating for short-term instruments, reaffirmed from FY20 through FY24.
- Social spending runs through the group foundation - corporate social responsibility activities are undertaken collaboratively with other group companies under the Oswal Foundation, a registered society formed in 2006.