Notwithstanding the trouble in the mutual fund industry, SBI Mutual Fund has toppled Aditya Birla Mutual Fund to become the third-largest fund house in January amid dip in inflows into most funds. SBI MF’s assets under management (AUM) increased 7 per cent last month to ₹2.78 lakh crore against ₹2.60 lakh crore in December.

Aditya Birla Mutual Fund asset registered a moderate growth of 0.6 per cent at ₹2.43 lakh crore against ₹2.42 lakh crore logged in December. In fact, the fund house’s AUM is close to the January 2018 level of ₹2.46 lakh crore. HDFC Mutual Fund maintained its top slot with 1 per cent increase in its asset at ₹3.39 lakh crore (₹3.35 lakh crore) while ICICI Prudential MF with an increase of 1.6 per cent in assets to ₹3.16 lakh crore (₹3.10 lakh crore) was ranked second.

DP Singh, Executive Director, SBI Mutual Fund, said the fund house has been promoting fixed maturity plans in the last eight months when others were pushing equity schemes and this has worked wonders for SBI MF investors now.

SIP book rises 55%

The fund house’s systematic investment book has gone up 55 per cent to ₹1,040 crore while exchange-traded fund assets stood at ₹60,000 crore with Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation investment in its ETF scheme at about ₹42,000 crore.

Inflow from retail investors for the industry was down substantially while SBI MF has managed to restrict the fall to 20-25 per cent by promoting low-risk products to investors, said Singh.

Inflows into equity schemes of MFs had plunged 60 per cent in the last one year to ₹6,158 crore till January against ₹15,390 crore logged in the same period last year. Inflows into liquid and balanced funds crashed 46 per cent year-on-year to ₹56,733 crore (₹1,04,217 crore) in January.

Retail investors are really concerned over the change in equity market dynamics and the ensuing general election has added to the uncertainty. However, he added that historically markets have rallied after elections as any party coming to power cannot reverse economic reforms that have already been implemented. The only real concern is when there is a hung Parliament with no single party getting clear majority, said Singh.

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