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Nithin Kamath

Co-founder & CEO, Zerodha

Photo: Karthik Rangappa, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

About

Nithin Kamath is the founder and chief executive of Zerodha, the Bengaluru stockbroker he started with his younger brother Nikhil on 15 August 2010. Zerodha introduced discount broking to India with a flat fee of ₹20 per trade regardless of order size, replacing the percentage-based commissions charged by traditional brokers, and it has never raised outside funding. Born in Shivamogga, Karnataka, in 1979, Kamath moved with his family to Bengaluru in 1996 and began trading at 17, at first on his father's account. He traded on his own from 1997 to 2004, working nights at a call centre between 2001 and 2004, and then spent six years as a sub-broker with Kamath Associates, a Reliance Money franchise, before launching Zerodha. In 2015 he set up Rainmatter, Zerodha's fintech fund and incubator, and he also co-founded the investment firm True Beacon with Nikhil.

Zerodha's flat-fee model forced established brokers to rethink pricing and helped it grow with little advertising spend. It was the largest Indian broker by active NSE clients for several years until September 2023, when Groww moved ahead (6.63 million active clients against Zerodha's 6.48 million). Zerodha says it serves more than 1.8 crore clients and accounts for over 15% of Indian retail trading volumes. Kamath's recognitions include the Economic Times Startup of the Year (Bootstrap) award in 2016 and a Forbes India Leadership Award in 2019.

Source: en.wikipedia.org

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