SBI Mutual Fund, which has recently become the fourth-largest fund house (by average quarterly AUM), is now eyeing pole position in the mutual fund industry, a top official said.

This fund house is also confident of entering the top-three league in terms of assets under management (AUM) during the current fiscal itself, DP Singh, Executive Director & Chief Marketing Officer, SBI Mutual Fund, said.

In the September 2018 quarter, SBI Mutual Fund overtook Reliance MF to become the fourth-largest player with an AUM of ₹2.53 lakh crore.

“Not only are we confident about sustaining our lead over the player we displaced, but very soon we will also be the number three player. This should happen before end March 2019,” Singh told BusinessLine .

Singh attributed the growth of SBI Mutual Fund to multiple factors, including its ability to rope in more retail customers and expand reach.

Inclusive growth

“Superior fund performance and new initiatives for retail investors has fuelled this growth and increase in market share for SBI MF. We have grown inclusively in all channels and all asset classes,” he said.

He said that the fund’s strategy has been to come up with simple products, noting that people are not interested in complex products.

Singh said that SBI Mutual Fund has now set its sights on becoming the mutual fund industry leader.

“What State Bank of India is to the Indian banking industry, we (SBI Mutual Fund) want to be in the mutual fund industry. We have so far not talked about this aspiration of becoming the industry No 1, but now we feel we can achieve this sooner than later,” he said.

Singh also said that SBI Mutual Fund’s board was last briefed in 2015 about the growth aspiration of becoming part of the top-three in five years (by 2020). “Now, we are well on course to achieving this and become part of the top-three league this fiscal itself,” he said.

Going by AMFI data as of end September, ICICI Prudential MF is the country’s largest mutual fund house in terms of AUM, followed by HDFC Mutual Fund and Aditya Birla Sunlife MF. SBI MF and Reliance MF are ranked fourth and fifth, respectively.

Innovation

Singh said the fund has moved from product selling to solution selling. “The narrative in the industry has to change from product selling to solution selling. Going forward, service and solutions and not products will differentiate fund houses.”

Asked if the mutual fund industry would be able to innovate more to bring differentiated products, he replied in the negative.

“With new categorisation of SEBI, the so-called innovation is hardly possible. Now what will matter is research, investment and reach capability,” Singh said.

Singh also said SBI Mutual Fund would continue to plumb deep into the SBI bank branch network for offering its mutual fund products to SBI’s (bank) customers.

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