Daybreak - Inside the financial playbooks of India’s wealthiest women

Episode Date: May 29, 2025

In this special episode, hosts Snigdha Sharma and Rahel Philipose are joined by Soumya Rajan, founder and CEO of Waterfield Advisors, India’s largest multi-family office and wealth advisory firm. The conversation begins with a simple but important question: what does financial empowerment actually mean for women with wealth?Over her decades in the world of wealth management, Soumya began noticing a consistent blind spot—traditional financial systems weren’t designed with women’s realities in mind. Even wealth advisory firms, she found, were falling short. That led her to launch HERitage, a specialized arm within Waterfield, focused on serving the financial needs of women more intentionally and effectively.Soumya explains a framework she developed called T.O.U.C.H to outline how women tend to invest differently from men: they trade less, invest with clear goals, prioritize sustainability, and are more conscious and diversified in their approach. These patterns aren’t just preferences, they reflect a fundamentally different way of thinking about money.The episode also draws on insights from Waterfield’s Women of Wealth survey, which looked at the investment behaviors of over 100 high-net-worth Indian women. The findings challenge a lot of conventional thinking: women are deliberate and strategic investors, but they still face barriers when it comes to financial literacy, access, and decision-making power.Soumya also talks about how women in India are creating wealth—whether through inheritance, entrepreneurship, or leadership roles in corporate India—and how they’re using that wealth not just for security, but for impact. The conversation touches on growing trends in philanthropy, interest in global markets, and the rise of “passion investments” in areas like art, wellness, and legacy building.Tune in Soumya recommends —TV Show: Lioness Book: The Outsiders Tell us what you thought of this episode. You can text us your feedback on WhatsApp at [phone]. You can also write to us at [e-mail] is produced from the newsroom of The Ken, India’s first subscriber-only business news platform. Subscribe for more exclusive, deeply-reported, and analytical business stories.

Hi, this is Rohan Dharma Kumar. If you've heard any of the Ken's podcasts, you've probably heard me, my interruptions, my analogies and my contrarian takes on most topics. And you might rightly be wondering why am I interrupting this episode too. It's for a special announcement. For the last few months, I and Sita Raman Ganesh, my colleague and the Ken's deputy editor, have been working on an ambitious new podcast.

It's called Intermission. We want to tell the Sita Ramancahans, my colleague. secret sauce stories of India's greatest companies. Stories of how they were born, how they fought to survive, how they build their organizations and culture, how they managed to innovate and thrive over decades, and most importantly, how they're poised today. To do that, Sita and I have been reading books, poring over reports, going through financial statements, digging up archives, and talking to dozens of people.

And if that wasn't enough, we also decided to throw in video into. to the mix. Yes, you heard that right. Intermission has also had to find its footing in the world of multi-camera shoots in professional studios, laborious editing, and extensive post-production. Sita and I are still reeling from the intensity of our first studio recording. Intermission launches on March 23rd. To get an alert, as soon as we release our first episode, please follow Intermission on Spotify and Apple Podcast. or subscribe to the Ken's YouTube channel. You can find all of the links at the ken.com slash I am.

With that, back to your episode. Hi there. You are listening to the 500th episode of Daybreak. This is a pretty big deal for us. It is a major milestone. So if you've been part of our journey for some time now, thank you. We could not have done it without you. If you're new here, thank you for tuning in.

We have some big things planned for the future. so watch the space. Of course, we do still have a long way to go. So if you have thoughts on this episode or daybreak in general, please write to us. We will add our WhatsApp number and email IDs in the show notes. One last thing. Could you also take a moment to rate and comment

on whatever podcast platform you are currently using? It will really help other people discover daybreak. And now, back to our 500th episode. It's a special one. Hello, daybreak listeners. I'm your host, Nekda. And today, Rahil and I are joined by a very special guest in the studio. Somia Rajan.

Somia is the founder and CEO of Waterfield Advisors, which is India's largest multifamily office and wealth advisory firm. And they manage over $4 billion for their clients. Hi, Somia. Welcome to daybreak. Hi, Snikda. Rahil, lovely to be here. And thank you for having me. Thank you so much for joining us.

So very soon into her journey into wealth management, Somaya realized how financial realities for women are very different from men. I mean, for starters, we just live longer on average. We take career breaks and just in general we have different goals when it comes to money. But most wealth management firms have not been able to cater to these needs. So, Somia launched Heritage, which is an arm of water field. It is a wealth advisory farm that is for, sorry, arm that is tailored specifically for women. and last year they conducted a very important and interesting survey which was titled

Women of Wealth to understand the gap between what women investors seek and the services that are currently extended to them. The survey was carried out among 104 H&I or high net worth women, each commanding a net worth of over 10 crore rupees or more. They spanned from the age of 22 to 60 years old and they came from very diverse professional backgrounds. So today we'll be talking to Somia about how H&I women in India thinking about their wealth, how they invest, the kind of legacies that they're building, and the unique opportunities and challenges that they face. Okay, so Somia, to start with, very simple question, do men and

women invest differently? Do they look at money differently? Snikta, they absolutely do. The way in which women invest as opposed to men is quite different. This is something that we've kind of seen based on the experience of working with multiple women, whether they're inheritors, entrepreneurs, or professionals. And I'd like to kind of summarize that in what I call a woman's touch. And touch really is an acronym for the way and the difference in the way women invest as opposed to men. and T for instance for they trade less and they earn more

which means that they allow for their investments to actually compound so they don't keep churning the portfolio which can be very common when you see how most men or women may look at investing but women actually trade much less

so T is for trading less O is what I call their orientation to go goals. So women, when they are investing, they're not investing merely for speculative gains. It's always for a purpose. And the goal could be their retirement. The goal could be for their children's education. The goal could be for their business to set up a foundation. But it's always with the intent of I'm investing because the investment portfolio is doing something for me. So always orientation to goals. You is what I say is what we see when there is.

investing is for using sustainable strategies. Most women are actually oriented towards incorporating ESG or values or purpose into their investment goals. A study that was actually done by Morgan Stanley when they asked men and women, how many of you would use ESG for your investments? 84% of women investors said that they wanted to be guided by ESG goals in their investments. only 67% of men. So what's interesting is that when they are looking at their investment portfolios, they're integrating this into their decision-making. C is what I call their consciousness in their decision-making.

So most people will turn around and say that, or the stereotype woman is someone who is risk-averse. Whereas my interpretation is that they are risk-aware. So they are actually studying more, making more informed decisions, educating themselves, reading more, before they decide where to invest. That should not be interpreted as risk aversion. That needs to be interpreted as risk awareness. So there is a consciousness in their decision making when they're making their investments.

And the H is for the fact that they hold diverse portfolios. they don't go into a portfolio saying that I'm going to be 100% in equities or 100% in alternates or 100% in real estate. They are looking at a more balanced view in the way in which they invest. So H is for holding diverse portfolios. So investments for women is what I call a woman's touch. They trade less. They are oriented towards their goals. They use sustainable strategies.

They are conscious in their decision making. and they hold diverse portfolios. It's very intentional in the way that they... Very intentional in the way in which Etchena women invest as opposed to men. What do you think that's the product of, Somia? I think that's because of... When you look at women today, they have access to tools, whether it is in the form of podcast or whether it's in the form of literature,

which is available through digital platforms, that wasn't the case earlier. And I think the access to these platforms, these channels, the fact that we have almost information overload right now is what is giving, I think, the women the confidence. It's still far away. Even in our research, we realized that while women wanted to be risk takers, and we also saw that, you know, 62% wanted to invest in equities.

That's fairly significant. Or 62% of them who were less than the age of 30 wanted to make investments into private markets, which is, again, high risk. It tells you that the intent is there, but they may lack the confidence today to be able to take those decisions, which is what our survey was saying. So our whole role, and I think as women in the ecosystem, needs to be how can we educate more women so that the awareness rises and they build the confidence to invest. And that lack of confidence is definitely a product of systemic structural failures. I'd love to go back to that moment when you realize that India's wealth management industry, its financial institutions, weren't serving women, in particular wealthy women in this case, in the way that they should be.

you know, and you noticed that those gaps, those unfair gaps, existed. And then how you saw heritage emerge, maybe as your answer to that need? I think heritage emerged pretty much as part of it was driven by just a personal sense of what I thought women were not getting. So when we started heritage and the H-E-R is for her in the name, we wanted to solve for three things. One, our target market or client base was women inheritors, women professionals and women entrepreneurs. Each one of them has a slightly different nuanced expectation from heritage. But the common thread for all three was that all these women were already financially independent, but they were not financially literate.

So when we talk about literacy and independence, it's two very different things. Our Waterfield, we're not trying to solve for the independence because we think that someone else is solving that problem. But what we want to do is to make women more confident and aware about the decisions they're making when it comes to their investment portfolios. So literacy was a very important part of what we wanted to address. So one of the pillars of heritage is literacy. The second is wealth with the purpose because again, coming back to the way in which we see women investing, they are goal-oriented.

But equally around being goal-oriented, they also want their wealth to have meaning. So whether it is giving it back to society, whether it is to support an entrepreneurial ecosystem, these are things which are decisions that they are consciously making. So for us, their wealth needed, to stand for something, and which is why we said it needs to be wealth with the purpose. And the third thing, which, again, was perhaps more a bit of a personal need, is the requirement

to have a community on networks of women. Because today as a founder, I feel quite lonely in terms of who can I talk to when I have issues around scaling my business, taking on a co-founder, deciding when to raise capital. You know, the old boys' networks are many. but the networks for women are smaller. We also found that, particularly on the investing side, most women tend to be quite afraid or afraid of, and I say afraid, I would say afraid of being judged

when they are asking a question when there's a room full of men and women. Women will not want to put their hand up and ask the question. So we realized that we needed to. create a community and a kind of safe harbour where it's just other women and we can ask anything under the sun it can be as silly or stupid or frankly those are never silly or stupid they're actually the right questions to ask but we have so much preconditioning at a social level that we think that we shouldn't be asking these questions so when we started heritage it was to say let's take out all these preconceived biases and notions that we thought women were coming in with and let's

free them of that and create that community, create that space where they could ask the question. So that was the basis of heritage. 25% of Waterfield's clients are women. And this is just a segment we want to grow. And we think we have a lot to offer. But what we want to do is to make it a place where they can learn. And that's really the objective. Right.

So, me talk a little bit more about, you know, because often the assumption about wealthy women is that, you know, they're just beneficiaries of generational wealth or family money, right? But like you mentioned earlier, like you have a diverse clientele, women clientele, right? Can you talk about the different types of, other types of, you know, wealth that exists? And also, you know, how they are in terms of financial literacy. Like, say, for example, somebody who has inherited a lot of family money, right, compared to somebody who's like a self-made entrepreneur. So I think you can make wealths in a number of different ways. In India, traditionally, it's always been the inherited wealth. You see very few entrepreneurs as women who have actually.

created serious wealth through that route. I'm hoping that that's something that's going to change as the years go on. And we just have a much more vibrant ecosystem for entrepreneurs. But you can create serious wealth through entrepreneurship. You can create serious wealth through ESOPs. And we've seen and we'll see a lot more of that going forward, which I think is a great testimony to the fact that women are rising to leadership positions in corporate India or the startup world. And the third is where you will actually create wealth, let's say if you're in private equity or venture. You're a partner. You're part of that ecosystem. You get carry. And carry over a period of time will give you exponential wealth. So these are the three areas outside of inheritors that we see

as how women will actually create significant wealth going forward. But I will say that today, one of the things that we would like to look at at Waterfield is, even if you are inheriting wealth, how are you using that wealth in order to drive and create impact? So just to give an example, you know, if you have inherited a substantial amount of money, we see many women actually creating family funds which are supporting the venture ecosystem. Their family offices are supporting the venture ecosystem. They want to make sure that they are able to give back,

even though they may have inherited the wealth. They're in a position to encourage more women founders. More women founders will then mean that you're going to create more jobs for women. So their lens also through which they are looking to give back, and we really shouldn't say that it's only the entrepreneurs or the ESOP holders or the people who are going to generate wealth in terms of self-made wealth. I think the role that inheritors can play is huge. And I think what's specifically relevant, Snigda, is that even if you were to look at

inheritance laws in India, it was only in 2005 that women could actually inherit ancestral wealth. till then they couldn't even do that. 2005 is just 20 years ago. So just think that these baby steps which have been taken are really leading to the systemic changes that you're seeing now. And that's something that we need to applaud and we need to encourage. But of course, on a more flippant note, how can you create serious wealth is marry rich.

as well. So that's just one more way in which you could do that. And there are many cases like that, which are also out there. So, Somia, you know, you were talking about how typically when women invest, it's usually very goal-oriented. They're usually working towards some sort of goal. I'm curious to know the role. Do they come to you, when a client comes to you and ask for your advice, do they come in with a clear sense of what they want to do, what that goal is? Walk me through that process a little bit. No, they're not. Actually, they're quite confused. And depending on the profile, so whether it's a inheritor, whether it's a homemaker, whether it's a corporate professional or entrepreneur, they don't have a good sense at all. Can I just say that's really reassuring? Because I thought my lack of financial know-how is a product of my tax bracket. But it's good to know. No. And I actually think that, you know, I, and it's not necessary.

It's actually, it's not necessary that you really do need to have that goal in mind. Because that goal may also keep changing, right? So today, I can certainly tell you that when you first start out, you think that you need a certain amount of money, let's say when you retire. or let's say at least in my generation, financial freedom was equivalent to retiring comfortably. Today's definition of financial freedom is the ability to work on your own terms. Very different.

But for somebody like in my generation, it was retiring comfortably. You were estimating that you needed a certain amount of money when you retired. But that goalpost keeps changing because your aspirations keep changing. the cost of living keeps changing. I always say that one of the things that most people never look out for in their investments is inflation. They don't realize that inflation is eating into their purchasing power. These are all important things for you to consider. As wealth managers, we try to walk a woman through these different risks, which are potentially there,

and try to help her identify what are those risks. Are those risks around liquidity? Are those risks around inflation? Are those risks around the fact that she may take a career break? And therefore, today she's planning with a certain horizon in mind. Tomorrow she has to take that career break. How do we still plan for her? It could be somebody who's just earned for, let's say, 20 years and then says,

look, I've had enough, I want to write a book, and then how she still has a good 20, 30 years more to live. Again, longevity is a big issue. People are living longer. So how do you then plan for that? Those are the roles that we look at, Rahil, because for us as wealth managers, we do two things. We help you to increase your returns on your portfolio. The other is that we help you manage risk. These are the two things, which is our role.

But we want to make it easier for you, and we want you to know that we are with you every step of the way. And life does mean that things change. But do they typically come in saying, hey, you know, I have this much money at my disposal. I want to give back. How do I do that? Is that as vague?

That could be one of the things. I mean, the thing is, and here, you know, I love to ask this question to whoever comes to Waterfield. And they say, you know, I want to. to have impact and create impact and I said, great. And then they'll say, you know, I want to do something in education. And I will look at them and say, wonderful education. And then I'm waiting.

And then there's this awkward pause. And then I'm saying, well, do you want to do something in primary education? Do you want to do something in school infrastructure? Do you want to do something in ed tech? Do you want to do something in, you know, K-12? adult literacy and then there's this again awkward silence

because they're trying to think through what in education do they want to do and our role again as advisors is to help peel the onion is to really sit with them and get to the heart of what is it that they want to do

do they want to set up a foundation do they want to set up a foundation in their parents' names do they want to set up something in as ancestral legacy. These are all things that unfortunately most wealth managers don't talk about because they don't spend time.

You know, all these issues mean that I need to understand you as a person in what is your goal, what is the outcome you want to achieve. Unfortunately, in today's world, we seem to be zipping from one thing to the other, but not pausing to reflect on what is the meaning of what, we want to do. So it's almost like when someone comes to us, we want them to just take a pause.

We want to say, let's reflect. Because once you reflect, you're then able to identify where you want to go to. And then we can help you with that. But these are questions that we want to help women with. They're all very keen to do something. I think what I love about working with women is they all want to have impact in whichever way it can be big it can be small but they want to make ensure that their lives have meaning our role is to try and help them with that that's amazing so yeah let's because this what you said about you know many of the clients who come to you right like maybe their priority their goals are not clear but there is intent right and that's what you spend time and try to understand. Now, this is not just true for wealthy women, right? It's true for, I think, all women.

What would be the top three pieces of advice that you give to your clients, you know, irrespective of their wealth, you know, and the kind of wealth, whether it's generational or self-made or whatever? I think the advice that I would give them is that wealth creation is a is a long journey and it requires patience. It's not something that you can say that, you know, I'm going to trade, I'm going to, I'm going to earn this much. And they shouldn't look at wealth as something which, you know, it's going to give me 15% year on year. And I'm going to, you know, just become enormously wealthy. in a short period of time, I would want them to spend time on the journey,

to understand the nuances of the journey. So irrespective of whether they are men or women, my advice to them would be to first understand what are those goals and what is that journey to get to that goal. And I'll give you actually an example which may be of interest, is that let's say that I'm somebody who is a conservative, investor, right? And I say that I will only keep my money in bank fixed deposits or tax-free bonds or something like that. Then what you'll find is that at the end of that 10 years, because you've

wanted to be very conservative, have you actually reached your goal? Probably not. But, and you will say that, you know, I've not reached that goal, but I want to be a conservative investor. But then there may be somebody else who says, I'm willing to be a conservative investor. But then there may be somebody else who says, I'm willing to take some risk, right? I'm in a tunnel. I can see the dark spots which are out there, but I'm willing to go a little blind maybe at times because I'm, and by blind I will say, I'm ready to maybe take some volatility in my portfolio because I've invested into equities. It may go up and down, but I may get to my goal faster. Now, for us, that goal setting is very important. and you could end up by, because you're a type of investor,

very conservative at one end, not reach your goal. So for us, I think reaching that goal is important, right? You don't want to fall short of that goal. So the path to it can be different, but setting the goal is important. And understanding what that individual's goal is is something that I think we think is extremely important. in the entire wealth creation, wealth preservation journey.

And it's for anybody. You can be 20, you can be 60, but we want you to have a goal. We want to know what that goal is, because that then helps us calibrate what the investment portfolio is going to look like. The second piece of advice I would give to anyone who comes to us to allow for the process of compounding to happen.

Way too often, you will suddenly see a slump in your investment. You will get very worried, but the fund manager is good, right? And you will then say, but, you know, should we pull out? Should we do this? Should we do that? And all those doubts come into people's minds. my advice to people would be spend time on the product, the security, the mutual fund, the fund manager, upfront, take your time. But once you've taken your time to invest with a particular manager, stay with that manager and allow for compounding to happen.

Because if you change and churn and chop too quickly, you're not going to get the benefit of compounding. And you have to remember that like securities and companies will have go through business cycles, it is possible that that happens to fund managers as well. But you want their intent to be right. So if you spend time on the intent, you will definitely see the effects of compounding. So that would be my second piece of advice that that would, I would say, for wealth, for people who are looking at wealth. Third piece of advice, people who have wealth.

are very privileged. They have a head start on a lot of other people. What are you doing with that head start? Are you in a position to pay it forward to someone else and make an impact in your own way, whichever way you choose to, so that paying it forward enable someone else to have a better life or better outcome.

So these are the three things that I would ask people who come to see us really focus on. Do you find that there's a difference? And we were talking about this before we got into the studio as well, right? Like how generations are just miles apart in the way that they think. And I'm sure that translates into how they look at their money as well. But with like wealthy women across generations, do you find that the way they look at, you know, beyond how they want to invest, but like, yeah, even how they want to give back, does that, do you see a difference there as well?

I think generationally I would kind of split it into Gen X and baby boomers on the one hand and millennials and Gen C on the other. When you look at Gen X and you look at baby boomers, you have to remember that these are women who have grown up in a scarcity economy. So for that generation, wealth is about saving. It's about protecting and preserving your wealth. Whereas for millennials and for Gen Z,

it's about investing. It's about growing your wealth. So there's a difference between investing and saving. And that is the stark difference that you see in the way in which these women approach wealth, which is also why you will see that when you look at, Gen X, so you look at baby boomers. They've come into wealth very late sometimes.

Many of them are homemakers. They also were not exposed to the kind of product set that you have today. I mean, when you look at private equity, venture, reeds, invits, digital gold. I mean, that's all you. Whereas in the earlier generation, you only had fixed deposits, tax-free bonds, equities, maybe. So it was just the breadth of products wasn't there. When you look at Gen Z and you look at millennials, it's very different. They are all digital natives. They're exposed to platforms that give them access. They have opportunities to research more. They are also, according to me,

probably more values driven. So if they see something which is, again, coming back to sustainability strategies or otherwise, perhaps much more inclined to invest into those platforms than someone else. So the difference is more, it probably all boils down to save versus invest. And the mindset is different and financial independence. I mean, let's not forget that, you know, for Gen Z and the millennials, today you have a 41, 42% female labor market participation rate. When I first entered the, you know, the workforce, it was 30%. 30 then actually dipped to 20 or something like that and then has now gone back to 40.

So you're seeing much more financial independence now, which is fantastic. Absolutely. Right. If we can talk a little bit about women under 30, right? They are, I mean, comparatively more open to risk as well, which makes sense based on what you said. You know, and in the report it said that, you know, they still favor real estate as an investment. And that is quite surprising, Somia, because, you know, it seems in general, like real estate has kind of lost its appeal among the younger generation today. Even amongst us, right, like when we look at saving and investment, we're not really looking at, you know, investing in real estate as much.

why do you think real estate continues to resonate with young and wealthy women investors? I think it has to do almost with having your first home. The security of having your first home and that's how I interpreted the feedback. I will say, I think that I was very surprised as well because as we're seeing the greater financialization of assets, you would think that more women were moving towards that. And there are statistics that show that, but it was interesting to see real estate. And I thought that was really because women want that security of having their first home. I suspect that once that's done and they've got that, it's going to be more focused on capital market products and how they can access that.

Specifically, you know, when you look at some of the mutual fund data, which again, I use as largely a barometer of what is happening. because most, at the end of the day, whether you're wealthy, whether you're an early investor or somebody who has considerable wealth, the go-to investment vehicle is still a mutual fund because it is so tax-efficient at the end of the day. So, irrespective of what strata of wealth you're in, mutual funds still form the bulk of your investments. Here, it's interesting to note that in the last five years, women's AUM have actually doubled.

And it, and they comprise today, folios are about 25% of all mutual fund portfolios are held by women. 33% of the AUM is from women. 74% of women who are, who are less than 35, are actually mutual fund, are mutual fund holders. So when you look at some of these statistics, it's, clearly telling you that women are accessing mutual funds and as a vehicle to enhance and grow their wealth. 30% of SIPs are from women. So when you look at these statistics, I'm saying, this is great. This is wonderful. Women are finally finding their own voice in terms of financial independence and making their wealth grow. The interesting contradiction there, though,

and this is something that you found in your survey as well, there are still very few women taking part in financial decision making within family setups. Why do you think it is that, you know, while the statistics are so, I mean, it's so great to hear those numbers, why do you think that there is that hesitation around taking charge of your own money? Here I'm wondering, you know, the way I again interpret the data here, Rahil, is that are these women who are not participating more in, traditional family businesses.

I would suspect that if it's entrepreneurs or corporate professionals, they may be taking a little bit more control, though I will say it is still much less, because my view for corporate professionals is that they tend to ask a male member of their family. It could be brothers, it could be fathers, husbands to look after the investments because they are so busy multitasking on so many other issues. If someone else can do it, let them do it. That's not a good strategy because the thing is women live longer than men.

They're going to suddenly end up with not knowing what's happening in their portfolios. But my sense is that for women and family businesses, it's a little tougher because if they are not in the business, then they may not necessarily have a voice. if they are homemakers, then one of the things that you need in order to be able to also invest is you need to also have the cash flow. You need to have the money or somebody has to give you that money. If somebody has to give you that money, then it's always a feeling of, it's a secondary kind of cash flow that you're getting. So then you don't want to make mistakes.

And then you're always kind of not wanting to be judged again, coming back to those points. And therefore, they may not be as actively involved. One of the things that I do share with women and family businesses is that you have to earn your right in some ways to participate in those decisions, which means that you have to participate in investment committees. You have to be part of the family council. You have to share your knowledge. It means you have to read more. typically with family businesses and a lot of them are like

so old and have these huge legacies I'm sure it must be so challenging to break into those it is it is so you need the right governance structures and if those governance structures are there then you can put up your hand and you can say that you can participate in a committee

you can participate and say that look these are my views but you can't do that around a dining table you've got to do that around a more formal governance structure. But for that, women have to be educated. They have to earn the right to have a seat at the table. And that's only going to come from competence. That's not going to come because of,

you know, I am born into this family. And that, I think, women do recognize. But if you can do that, then you will have more control. But I would see that as, you know, one of the red flags in the in the study is that not or less than 50% women feel that they have a say in financial decision making which for me would is a red flag the only way to change that is educated educate educate you know let's not take away just you have to be competent what you do right you know another finding samia in the survey was that you know more than 40% of women are investing and this is something that you said at the very onset of this conversation. They're investing in three or more asset classes, right?

Of course, this does mean stronger financial, you know, independence, confidence. But if you had to compare, do you think men would roughly have the same breakdown of assets and also are like really diverse portfolios necessarily a good thing? Overdiversification is never a good thing. One of the things that we always see in client portfolios is they have too many products. I mean, too many products means you're just going to be getting returns equivalent to the index at best. So for all that effort of going into so many different products, you're not getting the outcome. Diversification is important.

Overdiversification is not. Diversification happens through asset allocation. And the asset allocation is how you can generate the alpha because, again, you use it as a risk tool because not all asset classes behave the same way at all points in time. And you want to make sure that at least some part of the portfolio is creating that alpha, generating the extra. For instance, who would have thought that for the last two years gold is the, is the, um, is the, um, generating. highest performing as a class two years consecutively, right? I can tell you, interestingly, in the mutual fund data, we saw that women have increased their allocation fivefold in gold, digital gold, in a five-year period.

I can tell you, most women investors have probably done better than most portfolios that would have been constructed by men because they have a natural affinity to gold. that was something that even Gen X and baby boomers were doing investing in gold and Gen Z and millennials have done it through digital gold. So it's fascinating to see that. So allocations are important. Asset allocation is very important. Over-diversification is not.

But I would say that men and women, the ones who are looking at, crafting their portfolios in a particular way, perhaps not very different in terms of the diversification of the portfolios. It would be, the asset allocation would be based on macros or otherwise. So you wouldn't see very big swings or differences. I'm also curious to talk about like investing opportunities abroad. Are women looking beyond India more now when it comes to investing? And what are the kind of opportunities that typically appeal to them? Is there a difference also in the terms in terms of the amount of risk that they're willing to take on compared to like really

rich men. I think the question, you know, irrespective of whether you're, whether you're a man or a woman, diversifying globally is important, Rahil. So I would say that it is something we should not ignore because, again, good diversification strategy means holding global assets as well. I do also feel that for women, what is likely to happen is that one of the reasons why they invest is also for their children's education. And I am seeing that more women would want their children to be educated overseas if the opportunity was there. And creating a pool outside of India is really the ability to one, solve for the diversification, but also potentially solve for the

corpus that's going to be needed if their kids want to be educated overseas tomorrow. With the rupee potentially depreciating as well, it is an investment over the next 10 years which will yield fairly rich rewards for them. The challenge I think that most women face or even men face is how do I access those opportunities? Because a lot of them, and this has been one of my biggest grouse is that everyone just looks at investing into the top companies that they've heard of overseas. So Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, Invidia is, you know, Amazon.

Tesla. That's about it. You know, invest. And, you know, they would have had great stories in the last couple of years. And everyone will talk about their investments they've made in these places and the huge returns that they've got. How it made the seed for their startup and stuff. You remember Chetra. Chetra.

When we spoke to her. I do about the $1.5. Our guest was Chetra. And she told us that she invested in Tesla and the returns that gave her actually helped her start my salt app. Yeah. But the thing is that here we're not talking about a year or two years or three years. That may be great tactically. But what about for a child's education 10 years out, right?

Companies do go through cycles. So when you're even creating that offshore portfolio, it needs to be diversified. It needs to be diversified just not through the asset allocation lens. It needs to be diversified from a geographic lens. So you don't want all your eggs in the US basket. You want part of it there. Which I'm assuming typically ends up happening also. 60 to 70% is always the US.

But what you want is can I get some exposure to China? Can I get some exposure to Japan? Can I get some exposure to Europe? And it's not as if each of these markets are going to do you know, are all going to behave the same. Not everyone is going to, you know, be a great investment destination year after year. But if you're in a position to create a portfolio

that has these elements, then at least you know that you are reducing the volatility in your portfolio because it is diversified geographically as well. What we've done at Waterfield is we work with a partner in the US, which is called Zephyr management. because I didn't want clients to have just single stock allocations. I wanted clients to have diversified portfolio. So it could be somebody who says, I want a balanced portfolio,

I want an aggressive portfolio, I want a moderate risk portfolio, I want a conservative portfolio. But then at least we can help you craft that so that you're geographically diversified and you're also diversified from the asset allocation. but it comes back to the goal. What is the goal? For some people, you may say, I don't want exposure overseas at all.

It's not going to make any sense for me. It's just going to be more headache because I have to fill out all these LRS forms every time to send it out and bring it back. I don't want that headache. That's also fine. That's fine. What's good is that even in India, you have many mutual funds that give you exposure to overseas. assets and you should then take that route in order to invest into mutual funds that give you

that international exposure and there are funds that do that there are feeder funds that do that you can use your rupee allocations for those exposures I think the important thing is to understand to create that diversification but also what is the goal that you have in mind if you don't want the money overseas don't don't do that just stick to what's in India use the global options you have here and diversify through rupee money which is also something people should do okay this is a question i've been particularly excited to ask about because when we when i read the survey one word that just popped out to me was something that you called passion investments it felt like the fun the fun so i want to know what that means in the world of you know uh hn i's hn i is are we

talking just like art kutore philanthropy and how have those choices is kind of evolved over time as well. Great question. Passion investments is, I think, to your point, Rahil, the fun part. It's called passion because it is related specifically to the individual. And it could be vintage cars. It could be jewelry. It could be wine.

It could be any of the things that really an individual feels very strongly, enjoys. and wants to create that more as an investment portfolio. And this is something that we found is, you know, art is the most obvious. And we do find more women actually oriented towards creating portfolios specifically to these areas. And then they're actually quite knowledgeable about it as well. So it's not as if they're doing it just as a hobby. They deeply research into these areas and create that. as part of their portfolios.

I think investing doesn't have to be boring. No, I'm sorry. I didn't know. I said I said it. No, no, I meant it that, you know, investments shouldn't be boring. I mean, it shouldn't be. It's not, aren't. It doesn't need to be.

And therefore, I think when you introduce this element into it, it then becomes more both something that you enjoy because you relate to it and something that you want to do more of. one of the areas that we've actually seen outside of passion investing which i think is specifically for women which is a little different is just the increase on how they're spending a little bit more she's not more on investment is more on consumption well uh wellness and health now that's a real shift that we've seen in what way like in in in the sense in you know just in terms of you once you've created the wealth and you have you're receiving some gain

that money is also getting consumed somewhere. But that consumption is moving into areas like health and wellness. So getting a grape trainer or like signing up for? Investing in themselves. Ivy drips. Exactly. The new fat. The new fat.

But these are just areas which 10 years ago you never saw. That's interesting. So the consumption pattern is changed a little so that the wealth that I create, I'm using it towards my own health and wellness, which was not something that we saw before. A distinct change. They want to keep aside money for that. And I think that's something which is interesting. The investment in themselves in terms of their own health and well-being is a trend, I think,

which is of the next generation a bit as well. But passion and investing, of course. It is, it is, it is an area, it's still very small. It's very, very small, Rahil, but an area of interest. Okay. Somia, just to wrap this conversation up, one last question I have for you. You spoke about the importance of awareness and educating oneself. A lot of, you know, we spoke about this earlier also outside the studio,

about how a lot of people are DIYing, you know, investment. right? Why is it so important to have a financial advisor? Because not everybody can afford it. You know, they think they can't, but what are the benefits? Great question. The reason why we exist is really because as wealth advisors, we're looking to solve for two problems. Keeping aside, you know, other services. If you just look at your investment portfolio, you, as a wealth advisor, you want to help your client enhance their returns and you want to help them in terms of lowering the risk in their portfolio. And a lot of times just doing it yourself, you may not be aware of some of the nuances that sit in markets. And I'd love to give you an example of

how we, these are things that just through the DIY route you may not know. So we've always been large proponents of index investing. We think that's a great way for clients to get exposure in a low-cost manner, which they can do themselves in some ways. But there are also nuances in index investments. Typically, a lot of what you'll be reading these days is that everyone says go towards large gaps. And they say, make your investments in large gaps, it's very safe. FIIs will come back. If the FIIs do come back, that'll be the first place to come back. It's safer and so forth.

But even within the large caps, when we look at the index, we always split it. We look at what we call the Nifty 50 and the Nifty Next 50. What a lot of people may not have known is that about two months ago, the Nifty Next 50 was actually trading at a discount of almost 30% to its 10-year average, whereas the Nifty 50 was only trading at a discount of about 8%. A lot of people would have rushed in to say that, you know, I will put my money into large caps, not realizing that the dislocation was actually there in the nifty next 50. So if you had money to put in large caps, we would have said 30% should go into the nifty next 50, 70% should go into the nifty 50. Now, that's not something that you would have picked up from trying to do it yourself. Instagram Reels.

Maybe Instagram Reels. I don't know. maybe we should now start Instagram deals on educating people in these nuances. But the thing is you could have missed out on that. And that's a very easy opportunity without creating a lot of volatility for the investor. So could you have worked with an advisor to have given you that insight, which would have helped you? I think that's what is the benefit of having an advisor because it will help you. to kind of position your portfolio.

Or for that matter, another example, when midcaps, their valuations are so high, right? And when should you be taking money off the table? Because again, what tends to happen in the DIY route is that you invest and you just stay invested. But there's also a time when you may have to just rebalance the portfolio. So let's say I have to shift from midcap, to large gap.

A lot of times you don't know what that point is, or at least the range of time when you should do that, because the investment is something that's perhaps last on your list of priorities. You've got a day job, you've got kids to look after, you've got your parents to look after, you've got a thousand and one things going on at home and at work, which you know that you're not able to spend the time to just figure out Am I checking the valuation for mid-caps or not?

The advisor comes in then to at least alert you to say that, you know, hey, this is happening in the market. Is it time for us to just do a little bit of rebalancing? Don't look at the cost as the issue because the cost actually will prevent the accidents. And the cost of the accidents may be much higher than the cost of paying that fee to the advisor. And ultimately, coming back to a point I made earlier, wealth is a long-term journey. It is not something where I'm creating wealth this quarter, next quarter, next year, three years, five years. We are talking here 20 years, 30 years, 50 years, compounding, rebalancing, realigning, your goals. Your goals are changing.

How are your liquidity needs are changing. You suddenly need money for a house. you've suddenly got an influx of money because you've inherited something. You know, these are life events which are constantly happening. Having somebody by your side to just help you through that journey is the role of the wealth advisor. So I wouldn't be short term. I would think about it as here is somebody who's going to hold my hand for my life journey and help me actually grow that wealth and invest that wealth.

That's how they need to look at wealth prices. Daybreak is produced from the newsroom of the Ken India's first subscriber-focused business news platform. What you're listening to is just a small sample of our subscriber-only offerings. A full subscription unlocks daily long-form feature stories, newsletters and podcast extras. Head to the Ken.com and click on the red subscribe button

on the top of the Ken website. Today's episode was hosted and produced by Rahal Philipos and I, Sinkda Sharma. And it was edited by Rajiv Sien.