History of PPFAS (1979 to present)

The history of PPFAS is the record of the businesses built by Parag Parikh , from his start as a Mumbai sub-broker in 1979, through Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited (incorporated 12 October 1992) and its Cognito portfolio management service (from November 1996), to PPFAS Mutual Fund , registered by SEBI on 17 October 2012 as MF/069/12/01. The fund house managed Rs 1,47,954.75 crore at 31 March 2026, according to the Annual Report for FY2025-26 of PPFAS Asset Management Private Limited .

Four dates are given as the founding of PPFAS, and each is correct for a different entity: 1979 for Parag Parikh’s career as a sub-broker, 1992 for the sponsor company, 2011 for the asset management company (AMC), and 2012 for the mutual fund. The sponsor ran a stock broking business on the Bombay Stock Exchange and the National Stock Exchange until March 2014, then left broking to concentrate on fund management.

The fund’s first scheme, PPFAS Long Term Value Fund, was allotted on 24 May 2013 and is now the Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund . Parag Parikh died in a road accident in Omaha, Nebraska, on 3 May 2015, when the AMC managed Rs 572 crore, and his son Neil Parikh became Director and CEO of the AMC from 5 May 2015. Six more schemes followed between 2018 and 2026.

Timeline of PPFAS, 1979 to 2026

PPFAS passed through four corporate forms in 47 years: a sub-broking business from 1979, a broking and PMS company from 1992, a mutual fund from 2012, and a fund group with GIFT City and pension subsidiaries by 2026. Rows citing Business Standard rest on a dated press report; every other row rests on a PPFAS filing, a SEBI-mandated disclosure or a publisher’s record.

Table: PPFAS milestones, compiled by webnotes.in from the sources named in each row.

Parag Parikh’s broking business, 1979 to 1992

Parag Parikh entered the equity business as a sub-broker in 1979 and bought a membership of the Bombay Stock Exchange in 1983, paying for it partly with his mother’s and his wife’s jewellery, Business Standard reported on 3 July 2014. The same report dates his equity research service to 1985. The current PMS Disclosure Document of the sponsor, dated 15 April 2026, says the firm “was founded in 1983”, which matches the year of the BSE card rather than the sub-broking start.

Business Standard put his birth in February 1954, reporting that he “turned 60 in February” 2014. The PPFAS Statement of Additional Information (SAI) dated 17 December 2014 lists his qualifications as “M. Com. (Ind. & Fin.) (Bombay University), OPM (Harvard)”; Business Standard dated his Harvard study to 1994 to 1996. The same SAI records that he received the Certified Financial Planner certification from the Association of Financial Planners, India, in 2003.

Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited, 1992 onwards

Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited, the sponsor of PPFAS Mutual Fund, was incorporated on 12 October 1992, according to Note 1 of its Annual Report for 2013-14 and item iv of its Form MGT-7 for FY2025-26, which gives the date as 12/10/1992. The date 12 December 1992, given on earlier versions of this page and several others, matches neither document. The company’s corporate identity number begins U67190MH1992, which records a Maharashtra incorporation in 1992.

The sponsor’s legal form has changed twice. It was incorporated as a public company, converted to a private company on 22 June 2015 after approval of the Registrar of Companies, Mumbai, and renamed Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Private Limited, according to its Annual Report for 2014-15; the members had approved the change at an extraordinary general meeting on 23 April 2015. It became a public limited company again with effect from 20 August 2020, by the AMC’s addendum of 31 August 2020. Its shares have never been listed.

Stock broking and its end in 2014

The sponsor offered broking on the Bombay Stock Exchange from 1992 and extended it to the National Stock Exchange “a couple [of] years later”, according to the company’s own history page at ppfas.com. Forbes India reported on 5 March 2013 that Parag Parikh closed the debt market division in 2004 and the institutional broking business in 2007. The sponsor applied in March 2014 to surrender its stock broker memberships of both exchanges, its Annual Report for 2013-14 records, and Business Standard reported on 3 July 2014 that an NSE notification dated 17 June 2014 showed the firm had last traded on 14 March 2014.

Offices in Fort and Nariman Point

In 2014 the sponsor’s registered office was at 103, Veena Chambers, 21 Dalal Street, Fort, and its corporate office at the Great Western Building, 130/132 Shahid Bhagat Singh Marg, near Lion Gate, Fort, according to the sponsor’s Annual Report for 2013-14 and the SAI of December 2014. The Great Western Building was the corporate office, not the registered office.

The registered and corporate offices of the AMC and the trustee company, and the corporate office of the fund, moved to 81/82, 8th Floor, Sakhar Bhavan, Ramnath Goenka Marg, 230 Nariman Point, Mumbai 400021, with effect from 14 August 2017, by a PPFAS notice titled “After several decades at Kalaghoda”. The AMC also keeps a corporate office in Andheri (East), per the SAI dated 26 August 2026. The PPFAS office and team structure entry covers the present offices.

Cognito portfolio management service, 1996 to present

Cognito is the discretionary portfolio management service of the sponsor, with a track record from November 1996 and SEBI registration INP000000241, according to the PMS Disclosure Document dated 15 April 2026. The company’s history page says it was “among the first set [of] firms” to obtain a PMS licence in 1996. The date SEBI granted INP000000241 is not stated in either document, so none is given here.

The sponsor’s Annual Report for 2013-14 gave Cognito an annualised return of 15.19 per cent from November 1996 to 31 March 2014, against 13.28 per cent for the Sensex and 13.03 per cent for the Nifty over the same period. Rajeev Thakkar , who joined the sponsor in 2001 and was its CEO until March 2012, managed the PMS when its assets were around Rs 300 crore, according to the SAI dated 26 August 2026.

Cognito is now small. At 31 March 2026 the sponsor ran 10 discretionary clients, all non-resident individuals, with Rs 41.38 crore, alongside 21 non-discretionary clients with Rs 143.13 crore and 38 advisory clients with Rs 362.70 crore, according to the April 2026 Disclosure Document. The three lines add up to the Rs 547.21 crore (54,721.22 lakh) of sponsor PMS assets that the SAI reports for FY2025-26. The Disclosure Document names Rohil Gandhi as Cognito’s manager and a Rs 50 lakh minimum, while the company’s history page says the service “ceased to accept new clients for [the] past decade or so”. The Cognito PMS entry has the detail.

Parag Parikh’s books, 2005 and 2009

Parag Parikh wrote two books for Indian investors, both published by McGraw Hill in India, according to the publisher’s catalogue:

• Stocks to Riches , first edition, published 20 October 2005 (ISBN 9780070597716).
• Value Investing and Behavioral Finance: Insights into Indian Stock Market Realities , first edition, published 15 April 2009 (ISBN 9780070077638).

Both books apply behavioural finance to Indian retail investing; the AMC’s own statement of method is collected in PPFAS investment philosophy . Business Standard named both books in its obituary of 4 May 2015.

Setting up PPFAS Mutual Fund, 2011 to 2013

PPFAS Mutual Fund took about three years from application to registration. A Forbes India profile of 5 March 2013, reprinted on ppfas.com, reported that Parag Parikh had applied for a licence three years earlier and received SEBI’s permission in October 2012. The documented steps follow the three-tier mutual fund trust structure of sponsor, trustee and AMC:

1. 8 August 2011: PPFAS Asset Management Private Limited incorporated, corporate identity number U65100MH2011PTC220623 (AMC Annual Report FY2025-26).
2. 24 August 2011: PPFAS Trustee Company Private Limited becomes a subsidiary of the sponsor (sponsor Annual Report 2013-14).
3. 13 April 2012: PPFAS Mutual Fund constituted as a trust under the Indian Trusts Act 1882, with a sponsor contribution of Rs 1,00,000 to the corpus (SAI, 26 August 2026).
4. 22 May 2012: investment management agreement signed between the trustee and the AMC (SAI).
5. 17 October 2012: SEBI registers the fund as MF/069/12/01 and approves the AMC by letter OW/23259/2012 (SAI).
6. 13 May 2013: the New Fund Offer of the first scheme opens.

The fund was registered under the SEBI (Mutual Funds) Regulations 1996, which the SEBI (Mutual Funds) Regulations 2026 replaced from 1 April 2026. Parag Parikh was CEO and Whole Time Director of the AMC, according to the SAI of 17 December 2014.

PPFAS Long Term Value Fund, 2013

The first scheme was PPFAS Long Term Value Fund, allotted on 24 May 2013 after a New Fund Offer that opened on 13 May 2013, according to the AMC’s Annual Report for FY2025-26. Its June 2013 factsheet printed an inception date of 28 May 2013, four days after the allotment date every later factsheet gives. The scheme’s name began with “PPFAS”, not “Parag Parikh”; the Parag Parikh brand came with the 2016 rename.

The scheme could hold foreign shares from the start, and its benchmark at launch was the CNX 500, which India Index Services and Products renamed the Nifty 500 from 9 November 2015. Rajeev Thakkar has been its equity fund manager and Raunak Onkar its manager for overseas securities since inception, according to PPFAS factsheets. Its regular plan returned 16.94 per cent a year and its direct plan 17.76 per cent from allotment to 30 September 2026, against 13.56 per cent for the Nifty 500 TRI , according to the PPFAS factsheet for September 2026.

PPFAS ran this one scheme for five years. At 31 March 2015 the AMC managed Rs 572 crore across about 4,000 folios with 35 staff, according to a Press Trust of India report carried by Business Standard on 4 May 2015.

Death of Parag Parikh, 3 May 2015

Parag Parikh died in a car accident in Omaha, Nebraska, on 3 May 2015, while in the United States for the Berkshire Hathaway annual meeting, Business Standard reported on 4 May 2015. He was 61, consistent with Business Standard’s report of 3 July 2014 that he had turned 60 in February 2014. Four people were in the car: Parikh, his wife Geeta Parikh, Rajeev Thakkar and Raunak Onkar. Geeta Parikh was reported in serious condition, and Thakkar and Onkar were treated for minor injuries and discharged.

Accounts describing the 2015 meeting as his first attendance at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting, including an earlier version of this page, do not trace to either Business Standard report or to any PPFAS document, so the claim is not repeated here.

Succession to Neil Parikh, 2015

Neil Parikh was appointed Director and CEO of PPFAS Asset Management “in place of (Late) Mr. Parag Parikh with effect from 5th May 2015”, two days after his father’s death, by an AMC addendum dated 18 May 2015. He resigned from the board of the trustee company with effect from 4 May 2015, the same addendum records.

The addendum does not make him Chairman. The AMC’s Annual Report for FY2025-26 names him “Chairman and Whole Time Director” and Chief Executive Officer, but no PPFAS filing states the date he became Chairman, so none is given here. His career before 2015, from the SAI dated 26 August 2026:

Table: Neil Parikh’s roles, from the SAI dated 26 August 2026 and the AMC addendum of 18 May 2015.

He holds a BA in Economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MBA from IESE Business School, Barcelona, per the same SAI. Rajeev Thakkar stayed as Chief Investment Officer and is a Whole Time Director of the AMC in FY2025-26. The Parag Parikh family and Neil Parikh’s accession entry covers the family’s holdings and roles.

Renaming the flagship, 2016 to 2021

The flagship has carried four names, each change made by AMC addendum and none changing its allotment date or lead fund manager. Two of the changes followed SEBI circulars that redrew the equity categories.

Table: names of the PPFAS flagship scheme, from PPFAS addenda and factsheets.

The 2020 circular created the flexi cap category with a 65 per cent equity minimum and no floor by market capitalisation, while requiring multi cap funds to hold at least 25 per cent each in large, mid and small caps. Unitholders had an exit window without load from 14 December 2020 to 12 January 2021, according to the AMC’s addendum of 9 December 2020. The rename history entry has each addendum.

Scheme launches, 2018 to 2026

PPFAS added six schemes in eight years after running one scheme for five. The allotment dates below are from the AMC’s scheme pages, and the AUM figures from the PPFAS factsheet for September 2026.

Table: PPFAS schemes launched after the flagship, compiled by webnotes.in from amc.ppfas.com scheme pages and the September 2026 factsheet.

Two of these dates differ from those in circulation. The Liquid Fund was allotted on 11 May 2018, not 9 May 2018, and the Arbitrage Fund on 2 November 2023, not 27 October 2023 or 3 November 2023. The Large Cap Fund’s New Fund Offer ran from 19 to 30 January 2026, and the Dynamic Asset Allocation Fund’s from 20 to 22 February 2024. The scheme launch timeline entry has the launch windows.

The ELSS Tax Saver Fund’s tax deduction moved with the law: the Section 80C deduction of the Income-tax Act 1961 applied up to FY2025-26, and from 1 April 2026 the deduction is under Section 123 and Schedule XV of the Income-tax Act 2025 , still capped at Rs 1,50,000 and unavailable under the default regime.

Overseas limit and the 2022 suspension

PPFAS suspended fresh lump sums and new SIP and STP registrations in Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund from 2 February 2022 until 15 March 2022, because the industry’s overseas investments had reached the USD 7 billion limit SEBI set in circular SEBI/HO/IMD/IMD-II/DOF3/P/CIR/2021/571 of 3 June 2021. Registered SIPs continued. The AMC’s notice of 30 January 2022 cited a SEBI email of 28 January 2022 and an AMFI clarification of 30 January 2022.

PPFAS reopened the scheme from 15 March 2022 by notice of 10 March 2022, which stated that new inflows would be deployed in domestic securities. SEBI let mutual funds resume overseas buying within their 1 February 2022 headroom by letter SEBI/HO/OW/IMD-II/DOF3/P/25095/2022 of 17 June 2022. The limits in force, USD 1 billion per mutual fund within an industry limit of USD 7 billion, are explained in SEBI’s overseas investment cap , and the episode in PPFAS and the SEBI overseas cap .

Growth of assets, 2015 to 2026

PPFAS grew from Rs 572 crore at 31 March 2015 to Rs 1,47,954.75 crore at 31 March 2026, a 259-fold rise, and from 49,05,542 investors in FY2024-25 to 71,97,905 in FY2025-26, according to Business Standard and the AMC Annual Report for FY2025-26. The flagship carried most of that growth.

Table: Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund month-end AUM, from PPFAS monthly factsheets for each month shown.

The flagship first closed a month above Rs 1 lakh crore in May 2025. Business Standard reported on 13 May 2025 that the scheme had crossed the mark during the month, before the 31 May factsheet recorded it. Whether it was the first actively managed Indian equity scheme to reach that size is not confirmed at a primary source, so it is not stated here as fact. The AMC earned a profit after tax of Rs 346.22 crore in FY2025-26, up from Rs 246.45 crore, according to its Annual Report. Year-by-year detail is in PPFCF AUM trajectory .

Unitholders’ meet, 2014 onwards

PPFAS holds an annual meeting in Mumbai at which its fund managers present the portfolio and take unitholders’ questions. The AMC’s archive of meets runs from 2014, the meet of 22 November 2025 was announced as the 12th, and the 2026 meet is scheduled for 21 November 2026 at Birla Matushree Sabhagar, Mumbai, according to the AMC’s meet page. The format is described in PPFAS annual unitholders’ meet .

GIFT City and pension subsidiaries, 2024 to 2026

The PPFAS group extended beyond the Indian mutual fund licence in 2024 to 2026 through two companies:

• PPFAS Alternate Asset Managers IFSC Private Limited, corporate identity number U66309GJ2024PTC156345, a Gujarat company of 2024 registered with the International Financial Services Centres Authority as a retail fund management entity (FDM2025FMR0814). It reported nil turnover for FY2024-25, according to the PMS Disclosure Document, and offers feeder funds and India funds from GIFT City through gift.ppfas.com.
• PPFAS Pension Fund Managers Private Limited, incorporated on 8 May 2026 as a wholly owned subsidiary of the AMC, according to the AMC Annual Report for FY2025-26. A PFRDA registration for it as a National Pension System fund manager is not confirmed at a primary source.

The PPFAS GIFT City overseas structures and PPFAS group structure entries map the group.

Corrections to earlier accounts

Ten dates and details in circulation about PPFAS history, including in the May 2026 version of this page, do not match the primary documents, the commonest being a sponsor incorporation date of 12 December 1992 instead of 12 October 1992.

Table: corrections to PPFAS history, compiled by webnotes.in.

The B.Com from Sydenham College, the 2010 SEBI in-principle approval and the opening of a Borivali investor service centre on 19 February 2026, all stated in the earlier version, could not be confirmed at a primary source, so none is stated here.

See also

• PPFAS Mutual Fund
• PPFAS Asset Management Private Limited
• Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited
• PPFAS Trustee Company Private Limited
• PPFAS group structure
• Parag Parikh
• Neil Parikh
• Parag Parikh family and Neil Parikh’s accession
• Rajeev Thakkar
• Raunak Onkar
• Cognito PMS
• Stocks to Riches
• Value Investing and Behavioral Finance
• PPFAS investment philosophy
• PPFAS value investing
• PPFAS behavioural finance
• PPFAS scheme launch timeline 2013 to 2026
• PPLTVF to PPLTEF to PPFCF rename history
• PPFCF AUM trajectory
• PPFAS and the SEBI overseas cap
• PPFAS annual unitholders’ meet
• PPFAS office and team structure
• PPFAS GIFT City overseas structures
• PPFAS stance on not chasing AUM
• Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund
• Parag Parikh Liquid Fund
• Parag Parikh ELSS Tax Saver Fund
• Parag Parikh Conservative Hybrid Fund
• Parag Parikh Arbitrage Fund
• Parag Parikh Dynamic Asset Allocation Fund
• Parag Parikh Large Cap Fund
• Portfolio management service in India
• Mutual fund trust structure
• SEBI (Mutual Funds) Regulations 2026
• SEBI overseas investment cap for mutual funds
• Flexi cap mutual funds in India
• Bombay Stock Exchange
• National Stock Exchange
• SEBI

External references

• PPFAS Limited, “Our Company”: ppfas.com/about/our-company
• PPFAS Limited, PMS Disclosure Document, 15 April 2026: ppfas.com
• PPFAS Mutual Fund, Statement of Additional Information: amc.ppfas.com/downloads/SAI.pdf
• PPFAS Mutual Fund, addendum on the appointment of Neil Parikh, 18 May 2015: amc.ppfas.com
• PPFAS Mutual Fund, factsheets: amc.ppfas.com/downloads/factsheet/
• SEBI: sebi.gov.in

References

1. Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited, Annual Report 2013-14 (Note 1; Directors’ Report; PMS performance table) and Annual Report 2014-15 (conversion to a private company).
2. Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited, Form MGT-7, Annual Return for FY2025-26.
3. Parag Parikh Financial Advisory Services Limited, Disclosure Document for Portfolio Management Services under Regulation 22 of the SEBI (Portfolio Managers) Regulations 2020, dated 15 April 2026.
4. PPFAS Mutual Fund, Statement of Additional Information, 26 August 2026, and Statement of Additional Information, 17 December 2014.
5. PPFAS Asset Management Private Limited, Annual Report FY2025-26, dated 5 June 2026.
6. PPFAS Mutual Fund, addendum on the appointment of Neil Parikh as Director and CEO, 18 May 2015; notices of 30 January 2022 and 10 March 2022; addendum of 9 December 2020.
7. SEBI circulars SEBI/HO/IMD/DF3/CIR/P/2017/114 (6 October 2017), SEBI/HO/IMD/DF3/CIR/P/2020/228 (6 November 2020) and SEBI/HO/IMD/IMD-II/DOF3/P/CIR/2021/571 (3 June 2021).
8. Business Standard, “Street veteran Parikh hangs broking boots”, 3 July 2014, and its reports of Parag Parikh’s death, 4 May 2015.
9. Press Trust of India, report on the death of Parag Parikh, carried by Business Standard, 4 May 2015; Business Standard, report on Parag Parikh Flexi Cap Fund crossing Rs 1 lakh crore, 13 May 2025; Forbes India, “Parag Parikh’s Big Mutual Fund Bet”, 5 March 2013.
10. PPFAS Mutual Fund, notice on the move to Sakhar Bhavan effective 14 August 2017; addendum of 31 August 2020; annual unitholders’ meet page; SEBI letter SEBI/HO/OW/IMD-II/DOF3/P/25095/2022, 17 June 2022.
11. McGraw Hill Education India, catalogue entries for Stocks to Riches (ISBN 9780070597716) and Value Investing and Behavioral Finance (ISBN 9780070077638).