Overseas investments rise in India

Mumbai: Indian business houses are increasingly investing abroad. Last fiscal, the number of proposals for investments in joint ventures and wholly-owned subsidiaries stood at 2,261 involving a total investment of $23,072 million, reflecting a growth of about 53 per cent compared with the previous fiscal.

The latest Reserve Bank of India bulletin points out that 35 per cent of the proposals for outward foreign direct investment were towards Singapore, followed by Netherlands (23 per cent) and British Virgin Islands (7 per cent).

“Large Indian investments going to countries like Singapore, Cyprus, the Netherlands, the UAE and Mauritius reflect the generally liberal policies of these countries, particularly favourable tax treatment and investment protection treaties,” according to the report.

Indian companies have been allowed to invest in excess of 400 per cent of their net worth in the energy and natural resources sectors such as oil, gas, coal and mineral ores. The investment in excess of 400 per cent of the net worth has to be made with the prior approval of the Reserve Bank.

Sector wise, during the last fiscal, 43 per cent of the proposals were in the manufacturing sector, followed by non-financial services (11 per cent) and trading (4 per cent). Within the manufacturing sector, proposals were in the areas like electronic equipment, fertilisers, agriculture and allied products and gems and jewellery.

The RBI report further said the actual outward FDI during the year was $ 17,436 million, an increase of 29.6 per cent over the investments of $ 13,454 million in the previous fiscal. Of the total investments, 81.6 per cent were in the form of equity and the remaining 18.4 per cent were loans.

During 2007-08, inflows from India’s outward FDI amounted to $916 million, recording a growth of 76.7 per cent over the previous year.