Nithin Kamath reveals he would not have started Zerodha in 2025: ‘Don’t think it would make sense'
Nithin Kamath, CEO of Zerodha, stated he wouldn't have started the brokerage in 2025 due to market saturation.
Zerodha co-founder and CEO Nithin Kamath shocked many when he revealed that he would not have started his online brokerage platform in 2025. In a post on his Trading Q&A platform, Kamath was asked if he would have done anything differently if he started his platform in 2025.
Kamath gave a surprising response, explaining that he would not have started Zerodha with his brother, citing a crowded market. "We would not have started Zerodha. The market is so crowded, and being another one doing the same thing wouldn’t work. Also our product has evolved over the last 10 years, I don’t think it would make sense to attempt to beat the best today on day 1 of the business," he replied.
Kamath added that he would have instead chosen to build a brokerage offering better research. "I would have probably built a brokerage with some other moat probably. Charge higher and offer a better research maybe. Of course the customers would have been much lesser, but you could still earn significantly," he wrote.
Brothers Nikhil and Nithin Kamath started Zerodha in August 2010. The name Zerodha is a combination of words for the company's ideals: zero and rodha, the Sanskrit word for 'barrier'.
Nithin Kamath's warning
Zerodha’s co-founder issued a cautionary note on Wednesday, warning that if the Indian stock market keeps tumbling, especially in light of ongoing US tariffs, investors could pull out and stay away for years.
Sharing data which showed a sharp fall from 2008 to 2014 in net flows into equity-oriented mutual fund scheme, Kamath said retail investors have consistently been the net buyer of equity in the last five years.
"One of the crazy things about the last five-odd years is that retail investors have consistently been net buyers of equities. Whether they will continue to buy the dip is anybody's guess. By the way, if markets fall sharply, investors might stay out of the market for years -- just like they did after 2008," he said.
