Nikhil Kamath

Timeline

1. 1986Born in Shivamogga, Karnataka, and raised in Bengaluru.
2. 2003Takes a job at a call centre while trading equities on his own account, having left school after the tenth grade.
3. 2006Becomes a sub-broker, running Kamath & Associates with Nithin to manage portfolios for affluent clients.
4. 2010Co-founds Zerodha and introduces the discount brokerage model in India.
5. 2019Starts True Beacon, an asset manager for very large private clients, described in the press as a bet on lower fees for wealthy investors.
6. 2021Chess controversy: he uses computer assistance in an online charity match against Viswanathan Anand, apologises, is banned by Chess.com and restored within a day.
7. 2021Co-founds Gruhas with Abhijeet Pai, investing in climate technology, consumer brands, senior care and property technology.
8. 2023Signs the Giving Pledge, committing half his wealth to climate, education and health causes.
9. 2024Begins hosting WTF is, interviewing public figures and entrepreneurs.
10. 2025Estimated at 3.3 billion dollars by Forbes, and on the Forbes India rich list with his brother.

Early life

Nikhil Kamath was born on 5 September 1986 in Shivamogga, Karnataka, and was raised in Bengaluru in a Konkani speaking family. His father, Raghuram Kamath, was an executive at Canara Bank, and his mother, Revathi, ran an event management business that handled venues and landscaping projects, and was a trained veena player.^[1]

He left school after the tenth grade, so he has no school leaving certificate beyond that point and no degree. His first job was at a call centre, and he traded equities on the side with whatever money he could put up.^[1]

Career before Zerodha

In 2006 he became a sub-broker and started Kamath & Associates with his brother to manage portfolios for affluent clients in the public markets. The work was advisory and discretionary in the ordinary sense, which meant a percentage of assets, an ongoing relationship and a sales process.^[1]

Zerodha was designed as the opposite of that business, and he is candid that the two of them were the customer they were building for: traders who wanted an order to execute cheaply without being sold anything alongside it.^[1][4]

Zerodha

The firm the brothers built together is described elsewhere on this directory. Nikhil Kamath's contribution to it was the pricing argument: a flat fee per trade rather than a percentage of turnover, which is the change that took Indian retail broking from a relationship business to a volume business.^[1][4]

True Beacon and Gruhas

True Beacon, started in 2019, manages money for ultra high net worth clients through pooled vehicles with a defensive investment approach and a lower fee than the industry norm, distributed largely without intermediaries. It has continued to build its portfolio management product since.^[2][3]

Gruhas, founded in 2021 with Abhijeet Pai, invests at early and growth stages. It runs two main vehicles: the Gruhas Collective Consumer Fund for consumer brands, and the Earth Fund, launched with Brigade Group, for sustainability and property technology.^[1]

How he invests

Kamath's investment work is spread across three vehicles with different jobs. At Zerodha he is a co-owner of a business that takes no outside money. Through True Beacon he manages external capital for very large private clients, with a defensive strategy and a fee structure that undercuts the traditional wealth management model. Through Gruhas he takes equity positions in early and growth stage companies, mostly in climate technology, consumer brands, senior care and property technology.^[1][2][3]

The common thread is cost. He argues publicly that fees and intermediaries consume a large share of a long term return, which is the same argument that made Zerodha's flat pricing work, and it explains why True Beacon sells largely without distributors and why the fund house the brothers started offers only direct plans.^[1][4]

Wealth and what he says about it

Forbes estimated his wealth at about 3.3 billion dollars in December 2025, and both brothers appear on the Forbes India rich list through the same company, which is the unusual part: the money comes from a brokerage that has never raised venture capital rather than from a stake sale or a listing.^[1]

In June 2023 he signed the Giving Pledge, committing half his wealth to climate change, education and healthcare. He has said the commitment is easier to make than to execute, and the criticism he attracts tends to come from the gap between his public positions and his private decisions, as with the house purchase in 2024 after years of arguing that renting is the better financial choice.^[1]

Podcast and public positions

WTF is began in March 2024 and has become one of the more widely watched interview formats in India, with guests including the Prime Minister, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, A. R. Rahman and leaders of Indian industry. The format is long, and it has drawn both praise and criticism: a July 2024 episode discussing alcohol was criticised by a hepatologist for repeating claims about safe consumption that the medical evidence does not support.^[1]

In October 2024 he bought his first home, which drew criticism because he had argued publicly that renting is the more financially sensible choice.^[1]

The chess episode

In June 2021 Kamath played an online charity simultaneous exhibition against the five-time world champion Viswanathan Anand to raise money for Covid relief, organised by the Akshaya Patra Foundation and the All India Chess Federation. He won, and was found to have used computer assistance, which led Chess.com to ban his account for a fair play violation. He apologised, calling it silly and intended for fun and charity, and at Anand's request the account was restored within twenty four hours.^[5][6][7]

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