Ambit Coffee Can

Ambit PMS | Equity | | PMS

IME's View on Ambit Coffee Can

Strategy

Strategy focused on High Quality Franchises

Investment Fund

Would recommend that investors seeking to invest in this strategy invest instead with the strategy's original team who now runs a similar strategy at Marcellus (which carries lower churn risk and a team that prudently follows the philosophy).

Fund's Strategy View

Ambit's Coffee Can Portfolio follows its philosophy of only investing in the highest quality business franchises (often disregarding valuations). It focuses on high-quality franchises that can sustain their competitive advantages over long periods of time, regardless of the disruptions that they may face. This strategy has also demonstrated the ability to deliver sustained out-performance.

Fund Performance

The fund has underperformed peers & is amongst the worst performing schemes in this category in the last 5 year trailing returns. In terms of longer-term annual performance, performance consistency has been mixed, with the fund having outperformed & underperformed the bechmark roughly in half the years.

IME's View on Ambit PMS

View on AMC

Ambit PMS is in a sustained phase of evolving its core investment team, following the departure of key members to establish Marcellus in 2018. While Ambit's founding leadership remains stable, significant additions and changes within the investment management functions, particularly at the portfolio manager level, have occurred primarily since 2020-2021. For instance, the Head of PMS & Portfolio Manager joined in around 2021, and the fund manager for their flagship Coffee Can Portfolio was appointed as recently as late 2023. This indicates that a substantial part of the current core investment team is relatively new in their specific roles at Ambit post-2020. The risk of further talent migration remains a key concern, potentially impacting strategy consistency and long-term performance stability during this rebuilding phase.

AMC's Pedigree

Ambit PMS, part of the Ambit Group known for its strengths in investment banking and equity research, focuses on investing in high-quality businesses with strong accounting and corporate governance standards.

AMC Team

Ambit PMS rebuilt its core investment team after the 2018 Marcellus exodus; this largely non-founding team has consolidated primarily since 2020. Consequently, Ambit's pre-2018 track record is not applicable to the current team, and the relative newness of this core unit implies that churn risk remains a key concern for investors.

Investment Philosophy

Ambit's investment philosophy focuses on acquiring high-quality businesses with strong management and clean accounting, which is consistently applied across all strategies.

Investment Strategy

Ambit’s Coffee Can Strategy focuses on investing in a select set of high-quality Indian businesses capable of delivering consistent 15%+ earnings growth over long periods, irrespective of disruptions. The strategy seeks companies with durable competitive advantages that can sustain performance across cycles, making it less dependent on market timing and short-term trends.

Identifying High-Quality Franchises

Unique business DNA: Companies with a clear focus on core operations, technology as a backbone, independent boards, professional management, and evolving competitive advantages.
Consistency over volatility: Preference for businesses with stable and predictable earnings rather than volatile performance.
Low-risk compounding: Aim to generate consistent returns with minimal drawdowns.
Long-term ownership: Holdings are maintained as long as competitive strengths remain intact, rather than being driven by entry and exit timing.

Coffee Can Success Pillars

Lower drawdowns during market downturns
Low portfolio churn
Acceptance that market timing adds limited value

Key Tenets

Consistent track record: Strong history of revenue and earnings growth over 10–20 years.
Long-term wealth creation: Targets long-term earnings CAGR of 20–25%, with portfolio volatility comparable to government bonds over holding periods exceeding three years.
Low churn: Highly concentrated portfolio of 10–15 stocks, with intended churn of fewer than one stock per year.
No market timing: Avoids attempts to time markets.
Market leadership: Focus on dominant B2C franchises and companies with strong, defensible competitive moats.

PMS Background

Ambit PMS is part of the Ambit Group, a highly respected financial services franchise with strong capabilities across investment banking, investment management, and equities research. The PMS platform has gained prominence on the back of strong performance driven by a focus on investing in high-quality businesses with clean accounting standards and robust corporate governance. While Ambit PMS benefits from the broader group’s pedigree and research culture, it has also seen senior investment professionals exit in 2018 to form Marcellus and with some team members subsequently joining Avendus.

PMS Investment Philosophy

Ambit follows a clearly defined investment philosophy centred on long-term ownership of high-quality business franchises. The approach is anchored in rigorous quality filters and is willing to pay premium valuations for businesses that meet strict standards on accounting quality, capital allocation, and competitive positioning.

Clean Accounts: Extensive use of forensic accounting and capital allocation analysis to assess the integrity of financial statements and narrow the investible universe.
Capital Allocation: Focus on companies with a demonstrated track record of efficient and shareholder-friendly capital allocation.
Competitive Advantage: Invests only in businesses with strong and sustainable competitive moats, often paying premium valuations for top-quality franchises.

Investment Approach

Development of a proprietary, research-backed framework
Disciplined and process-driven investment execution
Focus on high-quality businesses
Long-term investing with low portfolio churn

Suitable For

Investors seeking exposure to the highest-quality companies, irrespective of near-term valuations, with the objective of long-term compounding from superior business franchises. The strategy may underperform during strong, momentum-driven bull markets.

Trailing Performance

	1yr	3yr	5yr	Since Inception
Ambit Coffee Can	7.9	12.2	13.4	14.5
S&P BSE 500	4.9	14.6	17.2	13.9
Alpha over Broad Mkt BM	3	-2.4	-3.8	0.6

Performance as of: 30-Nov-25 | Inception Date: 20-Jun-17 | Performance are post-fees, pre-taxes. Global funds denominated in USD or fund currency.

Investment team

Siddharth Bothra | 3-star rated FM

FM | 21 yrs Experience | 2 yrs at current firm

Past Experience: Motilal Oswal MF (FM), Aclehmy (Analyst)

Siddharth has more than two decades of experience in equities and asset management. His expertise spans large-cap, midcap, flexicap and hybrid funds. Prior to Ambit, He was in Motilal Oswal for 18 years and was the FM for their Focused 25 and Hybrid Fund.

Trilok Agarwal | 2-star rated FM

FM | 18 yrs Experience | 3 yrs at current firm

Past Experience: Birla Life Insurance (FM), Dymon Asia Consultant (Investment Consultent)

Trilok has over 16 years of experience in Investment Management. Prior to Ambit, he as a key Investment member at Aditya Birla Sun Life managing funds over 500mn$, He was also associated with Dymon Asia Capital briefly.

Bhargav Buddhadev | 3-star rated FM

FM | 19 yrs Experience | 2 yrs at current firm

Past Experience: Kotak MF (FM)

Bhargav has over 18 years of experience in equity research. Prior to joining Ambit, he worked with Kotak Mutual Fund and also worked with Ambit Institutional Equities.

Experience the benefits of working with a 'research-first' investments firm

Free 30-Day Trial

Get complimentary access to the revolutionary IME RMS (direct access to IME's central team insights across 1000's of MFs, PMSs, AIFs & Global funds - a first in the industry).

Additionally, a dedicated private banker will help build your financial plan, investment mandate & undertake a comprehensive portfolio review for free.