By Nesil Staney
Radhakishan Shivkishan Damani, the promoter of Avenue Supermarts, and ace investor Ashish Kacholia, two of the largest and most followed investors in India, are cautiously waiting to make fresh purchases through bulk deals. They last traded such deals in June 2024. Both were highly active in executing bulk deals earlier.
Damani executed the last bulk purchase on June 5, 2024. Since then, he sold shares via bulk deals 11 times. Incidentally, Kacholia, too, made his last bulk purchase in June 2024. He bought SG Mart, a B2B platform. Damani last bought Bhagiradha Chemicals. Since June last year, Kacholia sold via bulk deals four times.
A fund manager, who has worked with Rakesh Jhunjhunwala and knows both Damani and Kacholia, said they will be in action before long. “Many big investors and fund managers are holding cash for bargain prices,” he said. While Kacholia is buying stocks in smaller quantities, Damani is increasing investments in real estate, he noted.
Bulk and block deals are terms for large quantity of shares executed on markets. They are faster to execute, offer instant liquidity and provide clear pricing for large investors.
The stocks in Damani’s portfolio are held through Derive Trading, several investment trusts and in the names of family members. Derive purchased a 3.32% stake in Bhagiradha through a block deal on June 5, 2024 at an average price of Rs 188.49. It then sold almost 1.8% in India Cements for Rs 283 per share on June 27 through two bulk deals.
Damani and his brother Gopikishan Damani offloaded their shares in India Cements on the same day through four bulk deals. This was followed by five bulk deals of sale of VST Industries shares between July 24, 2024, and September 19, 2024.
Kacholia sold four times via bulk deals, with the last trade taking place on December 27, 2024. These were stocks of Sky Gold and Diamond, Repro and Universal Autofoundry. At present, his largest holdings are in Shaily Engineering (Rs 482 crore), Beta Drugs (Rs 238 crore), Safari Industries and Awfis Space Solutions.
At the end of the March quarter, Kacholia’s portfolio was worth Rs 2,789 crore. He added 8 stocks, though none through bulk deals. New additions are Thomas Scott, Concord Control, Infinium Pharmachem, Qualitek Labs, Naman In-Store, Z-tech, C2C Advanced Systems and Quadrant Future Tek. He pared holding in Awfis Space from 4.8% to 2.5%.
Damani’s portfolio of 12 stocks, including a 67.2% stake in Avenue, which operates D-Mart supermarkets chain, is worth Rs 186,744 crore ($22 billion) as of March end 2025. This includes Rs 2,450-crore stake in Tata-owned rival supermarket chain Trent and shares worth Rs 1,427 crore in VST Industries. Other prominent holdings are in 3M India, Blue Dart Express, United Breweries and Sundaram Finance.
Bright Star Investments is the largest among several investment trusts that hold Damani’s investments. Damani’s daughter Jyoti Varun Kabra is its primary beneficiary. There are also quirky names such as Mountain Glory, Bottle Palm and Royal Palm, among his trusts.
Damani family has big investments in Mumbai real estate and hospitality.