Young investors fuelling rise of Indian bourse

Number of investors has quadrupled over past few years, many of whom are below 40

- Rohini Mohan

Drawn by the prospect of better investment returns, young professionals and college students are flocking to the Indian stock market, helping to fuel its extraordinary rise in the last three years.

Between March 2020 and June 2024, the number of individual investors in India's stock market more than quadrupled, from 36 million to 160 million.

An overwhelming number are young, with 83 per cent of new investors registered in the last three years below the age of 40 and of income-earning age, said Mr Sundaraman Ramamurthy, chief executive of the Bombay Stock Exchange, at the Asia Securities Forum's annual general meeting in October 2023.

Among them is engineering graduate Devashish Dey from the small coal mining town of Dhanbad in Jharkhand state. The 24-year-old made his first share purchase in 2021, after watching Scam 1992, a Hindi biographical thriller about the meteoric rise and fall of flamboyant stockbroker Harshad Mehta. Although the show is about a notorious financial crime, Mr Dey was inspired by the protagonist's rags-to-riches journey.

Mr Dey's father sells household goods on a bicycle, and his mother is a home-based tailor.

"My working-class parents taught me and my brother to work hard and keep any big dreams in check," said Mr Dey.

But while in college, struggling to afford train tickets and meals, he could not resist searching "how to make money fast" on the internet. After rejecting many suggestions of fraudulent shortcuts to wealth, he chanced upon the stock market.

Without any mentoring, Mr Dey invested in the State Bank of India, a safe bet, and Burger King, whose burgers he loves. He later bought shares in the initial public offerings of start-ups like online cosmetics aggregator Nykaa and food delivery app Zomato.