From Bank Loans to Bond Street

Just as times change, markets also keep evolving, sometimes altering their behaviour forever. After decades of waiting, Indian bond market is gearing for tectonic transformation – a huge movement equivalent to the 1994 moment when screen-based electronic stock trading began with setting up of the National Stock Exchange. The benefits of this big leap from loans market to bond markets, for corporate borrowers as well as investors, and of course the government were plenty and led India to the developed markets league. This one single transition attracted billions of dollars in long-term fresh capital, which was much needed for building the country’s modern infrastructure, the sector with capacity to absorb that much size of the flows and also deliver sustainable returns to investors. From April 2019, several companies, perhaps all large listed ones, are going to hit the Bond...