Equity funds continue to witness outflows even though equity markets have revived. For the month ending November, equity schemes saw net outflows of Rs 1,304 crore. The net outflow in the equity fund category was on account of profit-booking by investors, said fund managers.
“Equities have been seeing outflows for sometime. Whenever there is an uptake in the market, there will always be a category of investors who will move out. It will only turn when the markets go into a new trajectory,” said Kaushik Dani, Head — Equity, Peerless Mutual Fund. The assets under management (AUM) of equity schemes stood at Rs 1.65 lakh crore.
Income fund see inflows
The total assets under management of the industry has touched a 32-month high of Rs 7.93 lakh crore, led mainly by an increase in the liquid fund category. Liquid funds’ AUM rose significantly by Rs 12, 606 crore to Rs 1.76 lakh crore.
The income fund category saw an increase of Rs 3,920 crore in the month of November to Rs 3.87 lakh crore.
“Inflows in the (income) category continued to be on account of new fund offers (NFOs) in the fixed maturity plan (FMPs) category as well as inflows into dynamic bond funds, short-term income funds and ultra short-term debt funds. FMPs continued to garner the majority of the NFOs in the month as investors continued to lock into the prevailing high yields in the market,” said a report by rating agency CRISIL.
Fund managers said that interest rates have peaked out, and, therefore expected to come down. This has led to an increase in investor interest in the gilt fund category.
Gold ETFs continued to garner assets with the monthly AUM increasing 3.8 per cent to Rs 11, 918 crore. The increase in AUM was mainly due to mark-to-market gains.
The only two fund categories to see a decline in the total monthly AUM are the other ETFs and Fund of funds (investing overseas) category.