Blackstone, the world’s largest alternative asset manager, has bought a 15% stake in billionaire Nirmal Jain’s financial services firm ‘IIFL Finance’ for around Rs. 5,000 crore will be invested. The investment will end months of negotiations with investors. Nirmal Jain wants to bring about changes in his company, so that he can repeat the great success achieved earlier in the wealth management sector here as well. Mumbai investor Rohit Kothari is also joining Blackstone through his fund ‘Anchorage Capital’.
Company promoters Nirmal Jain and R. Venkataraman Rs. 1,200 crore will be invested. The aim is to ensure that their total share remains around 25 percent. A total of Rs. 5,000 crore out of an investment of about Rs. 100 crores will be invested in Kothari. Thus the total amount of investment is Rs. 6,200 crore will be a little over. At present, foreign investors account for about one-fourth of the company and the same share is held by domestic institutions and individual investors.
The rating of the company will improve
Blackstone will purchase ‘Compulsory Convertible Preference Shares’ (CCPS), while warrants will be issued to the promoters. With this investment, IIFL Finance’s ‘Capital Adequacy Ratio’ will increase by around 5 per cent to 28 per cent. This will improve the company’s rating and reduce the cost of debt by 100-150 basis points. Blackstone will also get representation on the company’s board. After getting the board’s approval, the IIFL is going to announce the deal on Tuesday. The company said last week that a board meeting will be held on November 10 to approve the fundraising proposal.
A major change at a financial services company
IIFL Finance, Blackstone and Kothari declined to comment. Interestingly, while responding to queries on October 21, a Blackstone spokesperson told an ET report that their fund had not done any ‘due diligence’ of the company. The ET report quoted sources as saying that ‘Trilegal’ is the legal advisor to IIFL Finance, while ‘Khetan’ has advised Blackstone. He said the shares were valued by KPMG and BDO. On Monday, shares of IIFL Finance remained almost flat on the BSE and traded at Rs. 627.05, giving the company a market value of Rs. 26,763 crores. The stock has gained 19% over the last year, while the Nifty has given negative returns during the period.
The money was last raised in 2024
Nirmal Jain said in an ET report on 19 October that IIFL sold 10-20% stake to minority investors for Rs. 5,000 crore is planned to be raised. At the same time, promoters can subscribe to warrants to redeem their stake. The company last raised capital two years ago, in May 2024. At that time, soon after coming under the scanner of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for violating gold loan norms, the company through a ‘rights issue’ raised Rs. 1,272 crore was collected. Advent, TPG and Singapore’s Temasek Holdings were also in the race to buy a stake in IIFL Finance. As of the end of the September quarter, the company’s assets under management (AUM) grew by 38% over last year to Rs. 1.24 lakh crore has been reached.
Fairfax Financial Holdings will sell the stake
Apart from this, Prem Vatsa-promoted Fairfax Financial Holdings is preparing to exit IIFL Finance by selling its 13.7% stake to an investor. The move is part of a deal to acquire a majority stake in IDBI Bank under the government’s disinvestment programme. Fairfax’s stake will be diluted with the infusion of new capital, but the Blackstone deal will continue to have nominees on the board until it exits the company entirely, a person familiar with the matter said. In October 2025, Blackstone, its subsidiary ‘Asia II Topco XIII Pte. Ltd. in Federal Bank Rs. 6,196.5 crore and announced to acquire a stake of up to 9.99%. Blackstone is also the controlling shareholder and promoter in Aadhaar Housing Finance with a 65 percent stake.
