Lehman Brothers is considering entering the burgeoning Indian derivatives market, including a fixed-income derivatives operation. The market's product scope is limited to plain vanilla products, but growing volumes have been arousing interest among top tier derivative shops.
The exact status and scope of the Lehman plan could not be ascertained by press time.Jonathan Wharton, spokesman, confirmed the firm has an office in Mumbai but declined comment on what businesses it currently runs from there.
Finance Minister P. Chidambaram has been publicly championing OTC derivatives and served notice that reforms will underpin their legal status market (DW, 3/4).
One derivatives head at a bulge bracket house estimated that interest rate volumes in India have increased from INR1 billion (USD23 million) a year to INR30 billion (USD690 million) in the last four years. "After setting up in Korea we're actively looking at other countries," said an official at the firm, who declined comment on its derivatives plans. Lehman set up an onshore derivatives desk in Korea last year and subsequently has made a wave of hires for the effort (DW, 6/22/04).
