Canara Robeco MF announces change

Canara Robeco Mutual Fund has decided to rename the scheme "Canara Robeco CIGO" to Canara Robeco Monthly Income Plan" and to convert the existing dividend option of the scheme into monthly dividend option. The changes will be effective from 8 October 2009.

Canara Robeco CIGO has the investment objective to generate income by investing in debt instruments, money market instruments and small portion in equity.

Source: http://profit.ndtv.com/2009/10/08103432/Canara-Robeco-MF-announces-cha.html

Fund houses fail to cash in on market boom

Launch 14 schemes compared with 19 during the recent slump.

Considering over 100 per cent price appreciation in the secondary market since March 9 this year, mutual fund (MF) houses have failed to cash in on the boom as they launched only 14 equity schemes to mobilise Rs 3,841 crore. Surprisingly, in a down market, fund houses had launched 19 equity schemes between April and August 2008 and mobilised Rs 2,489 crore.
The Securities and Exchange board of India’s (Sebi) order banning entry load and another order asking fund houses to differentiate new schemes from the existing ones acted as a barrier. After the Sebi order, distributors were reluctant to sell new fund schemes, while fund houses avoided relaunching of schemes, said Surajit Misra, national head (mutual fund), Bajaj Capital.
The participation of retail investors in new schemes was much lower this time as compared to the boom period of 2007 when they invested huge sums in both initial public offers (IPOs) and new fund offers (NFOs), Misra added. Retail investors seem to have changed their investment strategy by shifting focus from equity funds to IPOs or investing directly through the secondary market.
With a buoyant secondary market, 11 IPOs have hit the capital market this year so far and they have received tremendous response from retail investors. These investors applied for shares worth of Rs 11,327 crore and ,in turn, were allotted shares worth Rs 3,925 crore. The IPOs from NHPC (Rs 6,570 crore), Adani Power (Rs 2,518 crore) and Oil India (Rs 1,275 crore) were well received by retail investors, while the remaining eight received application worth of Rs 983 crore.
Sundeep Sikka, chief executive officer, Reliance Mutual Fund, said retail investors have become more selective now. Now, they check the track record and brand name of a fund house and look at the kind of product before investing. New and innovative products would definitely attract retail investors. Timing of the fund launch is also very important, Reliance Infrastructure fund was new and innovative theme and it were launched at the right time because of that it attracted large number of investors and able to moped up Rs 2,300 crore.
In the past, fund houses were getting good response for NFOs. In March 2005, when the Sensex was around the 7,000 level, 8 new schemes raised Rs 7,016 crore. In March 2006, Rs 10,228 crore was raised by 12 schemes when the Sensex moved above the 10,000 level. In January 2008, when markets hit an all-time high, 6 new schemes raised Rs 9,000 crore.

Source: http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/fund-houses-fail-to-cash-inmarket-boom/372548/

FMC divided over allowing gold ETF trading on SEs

It is the most hassle-free route for retail investors to take an exposure to the yellow metal. But just as the gold exchange-traded funds (ETFs) were gaining in popularity, a tricky question has risen as to who should be regulating them, and whether gold ETFs should be allowed to be traded on the stock exchanges, as they are being now.

According to people familiar with the development, the consumer affairs ministry has posed this question to the law ministry, since the underlying for gold ETFs is a commodity, and should logically fall under the purview of the forward markets commission (FMC).

The law ministry had asked for FMC's inputs on the matter and the commission submitted its views past month. An official at FMC told ET that once the Forward Contract Regulation Act amendment bill is passed in Parliament, products like gold ETFs will become a part of the commodity markets, and will be regulated by FMC. But even before that, opinion within FMC is divided on whether gold ETFs should be allowed to be traded on stock exchanges. Some officials see this as an encroachment on the commodity market, while others argue that since gold ETFs are a spot instrument launched by mutual funds, there is nothing wrong in them being traded on the stock exchanges and being regulated by SEBI.

NCDEX chief economist Madan Sabnavis feels that logically since the underlying is a commodity, gold ETFs should fall under the purview of FMC. He added if such funds are launched in other commodities like soy oil there could be issues pertaining to prices, which FMC would be best placed to address.

Gold ETFs are gaining acceptance, but the products is yet to reach the popularity of mutual fund products. A total of six fund houses - Benchmark Asset Management Co, Kotak Mahindra Mutual Fund, UTI Asset Management Co, Reliance Capital Asset Management, Quantum MF and SBI Mutual Fund - at present offer gold ETFs in India.

According to data by the Association of Mutual Funds of India, assets under management (AUM) by gold ETF have risen 30% over the past one year to Rs 904 crore as on August 31, 2009.
Though gold collections under ETFs are growing, they remain minuscule when compared with India's gold imports of about 700 tonne annually.

Source: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Bullion/FMC-divided-over-allowing-gold-ETF-trading-on-SEs/articleshow/5095752.cms

Surge in equity fund offers in September

Nearly a dozen equity-based fund offer documents were filed with the Securities and Exchange Board of India during September, according to the regulator’s Web site.

This sudden spurt in the number of fund offers is despite the equity funds turning less attractive for distributors to sell after the scrapping of the entry load.

According to the Value Research data, three fund offer documents were filed with the regulator in July, four in August, while 11 of them have been filed in September. Of these 11, two are gold-based funds.

With the equity market on the upswing, mutual funds expect revival of g retail interest in the coming months, said the Taurus Mutual Fund Chief Executive Officer, Mr Waqar Naqvi.

Another attraction for retail investors is the Rs 10 face value for the new funds. For the existing funds, investors might have to pay the market price, which is higher, said fund managers.

The current environment is conducive for equity investments, fund managers said.

Mutual funds are dependent on market conditions when it comes to pushing their schemes, said a fund manager with a foreign fund house. Now, with markets in a bullish phase, it is easier to convince investors about equity products, he added.

Also, the previous rally of the Sensex, when it touched the 17,000 mark, was a very sharp rally and not many investors were able to ride that rally, said another fund manager.

Now, with the market momentum still in the upswing, analysts feel that investors would want to ride the next rally. The benchmark index Sensex rose by almost nine per cent in September.

While new fund houses would launch more plain vanilla funds , existing fund houses could go in for more of theme-based and more structured equity offerings, said Ms Lakshmi Iyer, Head of Products at Kotak AMC.

Even as there is a general positive feeling about the equity market, a section of fund managers feels that investors are still sceptical about investing at such high levels.

“The market is already at a peak and these levels may seem high for retail investors,” a fund manager said. Also the market has already priced in growth for the next 6-8 months, and there is not much scope for an uptrend for some time, he added.

Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2009/10/07/stories/2009100751830100.htm

Bank funds lead Indian mutual fund gainers in Sept

*Bank funds gain an average 15.8 pct vs 9.3 pct in BSE index *Diversified funds lag on lower gains from cap goods, FMCG
*Debt funds jump 0.75 pct as federal bond yields drop 25 bps

Indian funds investing in bank stocks recorded the sharpest jump in net values in September as shares of financial firms rose on prospects of better corporate results and hopes the credit growth would start ticking up.
Banking sector mutual funds gained an average 15.8 percent during the month, outperforming the 9.3 percent rise in India's benchmark 30-share index .BSESN, data from global fund tracker Lipper, a Thomson Reuters company, showed.
"If you are betting that the Indian economy will do well despite the global meltdown... this is the sector which will obviously outperform," J. Venkatesan, a fund manager at Sundaram BNP Paribas Asset Management, said.
"Valuation comfort is much more better here than any other sector," Venkatesan added.
He said most state-run banks were available at a reasonable 1.5 times their price to book value, while returns on equity were about 18 percent and improving.
Indian firms will start releasing their quarterly results from the second week of October, and advance tax payments indicate robust profits.
That should ease pressure on likely bad loans for banking firms and also boost prospects for credit off-take as corporates return to health and revive expansion plans.
Top lender State Bank of India climbed little over a quarter in September to 2,195.70, its highest close since February last year, as investors expected strong corporate earnings to boost the bank's profits and ease bad debt worries.
No. 2 lender ICICI Bank rose 21 percent to 904.80 rupees during the month, its highest close since May 21, 2008.
Actively managed diversified equity funds, the biggest category of stock funds by number and assets, recorded a 7.2 percent return, underperforming the main share index.
More tha 90 percent of them underperformed the benchmark index on lower returns from their large exposure in sectors such as capital goods, consumers and energy as well as exposure to small and mid-cap stocks.
The three sectors collectively controlled about a third of the equity investments of diversified funds at the end of August, data from fund tracker ICRA Online showed.

BOND, GOLD FUNDS

Indian fixed income funds investing in government securities recorded a 0.75 percent jump in net values in September as federal bond yields IN069019G=CC dropped 25 basis points. The prospect of an increase in the hold-to-maturity (HTM) limit for banks had supported prices in September on a view it would enable banks to buy more bonds and help the market better absorb the government's record borrowing programme in 2009/10.
The government plans to sell 1.23 trillion rupees of bonds in the second half of the fiscal year after raising 2.95 trillion rupees in the first half.
Gold exchange traded funds gained 3.4 percent during the month as the yellow metal rose primarily due to a weak dollar overseas, which spurred buying in the alternative investment.
Gold futures on the continuation chart MAUc1 ended September at 15,703 rupees per 10 grams, up 3.8 percent during the month.

Source: http://in.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idINBOM50357820091006?sp=true

Market still trending up; domestic consumption sectors good: SBI Mutual Fund

SBI Mutual Fund’s Jayesh Shroff in a chat with ET Now this morning explained that he still doesn’t feel that the markets have reached a bubble stage. His fund is very aggressive on the domestic consumption space and within infrastructure on the power space.

Do you believe that markets are fairly valued and that it was time to start booking just that little bit of profit?
The market is still trending up and in any trending market, market would usually trade above the fair valuation zone. So, the market never trades at equilibrium. On the upside it will always trade above the fair value and on the downside it will trade below the fair value. I think it is normal maybe and another thing that I feel is that the analyst community is behind the curve in terms of upgrades and we will see maybe few upgrades coming in post the results that will be declared this month and to that extent may provide a further fillip to the market.

Is there hint of a liquidity led bubble in the Indian markets, do you think that is a possibility at all?
It could be a possibility but it is just not a possibility in a very-very near future. So I think we still can’t say that we have reached a bubble stage and where you need to worry too much about excessive flow of money into the equity markets either from the domestic or overseas investors.

What could be the spaces that investors could look out for say maybe the next three to six-month time frame?
We as a fund house are extremely bullish on the domestic consumption space and maybe that would include food and food products, entertainment and so on. That is one space or one theme that we are playing very aggressively and I am also playing it in the funds that I manage very aggressively.
The entire cement exposure of the BK Birla Group eventually at some point in the future might actually be consolidated into one company. Do you think that is a potential possibility in the future and would you be positioning your own portfolios to see some value unlocking, value building when that eventually happens?
The promoter group has that decision to take and we do not have any clues to that. I think stock specific we would generally not discuss, but, in this case it is a diversified company which offers value in lot of the businesses it has apart from the real estate that it has, so I think for us and sum of parts make more sense. We have never looked at whether the cement business is going to get merged with some other company or not.

In the last one month have you been sellers in Indian equities?
No, we have not been sellers in Indian equities and at the best we would have actually deployed money because of the inflows that we would have received and I think the market is as I said earlier is trending up and would likely to, I mean is likely to remain buoyant for maybe at least in the extreme short term.

Your portfolio seems to have a positive bias towards the capital goods space based on the top ten holdings. What are the views on that space and the current valuations?
With the kind of demographic change that the country is going through and will continue to go through over next 15-20 years, the future of Indian economy and to that of extent Indian equities is extremely bright. Within that, as I said, the best play on of course this demographic change is the domestic consumption sector and that is what we are playing aggressively at this point in time. However, India is an extremely deficient country as far as infrastructure and the basic infrastructure is concerned and to that extent there is immense opportunity for players in that space to actually grow and expand.
Growth of 8% plus you are talking for a foreseeable future is not possible without development of world class infrastructure and the government definitely does not have resources and the capabilities to develop all kinds of infrastructure. So in India you have seen over the past two or three years that PPP that is the public private partnership has become a norm and has been very-very successfully implemented in lot of sectors which is a huge opportunity for infra place. Capital goods of course is one of the largest segment within the overall infra theme and primarily what we are playing here is the power sector.

Source: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/5090165.cms?flstry=1

Fund Primer — Equity Funds: Evaluate risk carefully

Investors often enter the equity market without understanding the risks. Such investment carries systemic risks, irrespective of whether one opts for direct exposure or through mutual funds. Here is a way to evaluate such risk.

To achieve financial goals, the first evaluation is the risk-taking capacity of the individual. People tend to take higher risks early in their career. Later on their risk-taking abilities are limited due to the lesser number of earning years.

The fewer earning years ahead limits the latter’s risk-taking ability even if the individual is very keen to achieve investment goals.

If individuals are unable to understand and assess their risk appetite, it may not be wise to hold risky assets such as equity.

Risk perception: Let us say that the risk perception of investors vary between 1 and 100 per cent. For someone in his 20s, equity may mean losing as much as 40 per cent of investments, while for his father, a 10 per cent decline could mean a high-risk strategy. This perception arises from one’s ability to tolerate risk.

Another key issue in which investors often falter is the nature of funds. Take the example of an investor who made his money in the derivatives market in 2007; this prompted him to use his father’s retirement corpus (earmarked for the investor’s sister’s wedding) in a high beta mutual fund, which fell by over 50 per cent in a downturn.

Two lessons emerge from this case: one, funds with a crucial financial goal in the near future cannot be exposed to market vagaries. Two, transfer of risk to a younger person does not automatically mitigate the risk of investing in equity.

The final step of evaluation is risk tolerance. If you cannot stomach losing money don’t barge into the equity market. If you are ready to lose at least 20-30 per cent, then you can consider mutual funds.

Risk tolerance: We come across advisors recommending MIPs to retired people as part of portfolio diversification. The advisor might know the risk profile of the investment but investor understands the risk only when he losses money.

To understand how it is possible to lose money without understanding the risk tolerance, we analysed the performance of monthly income plans (which invest about 80 per cent of the money in debt schemes and rest in equity).

The perception among individuals is that monthly income schemes declare dividends every month. Some investors enquire during market downturns why their MIPs are not declaring dividends. For instance, if an individual had invested in an MIP in January 2008, the one-year category average return of the scheme would have been minus 8 per cent.

The disparity between the best in the category and the worst was wide. The best generated a 20 per cent return in one year ending January 2009 while the worst lost 12 per cent. If you had invested in the scheme without understanding your risk tolerance and sold the units in loss in panic, your tolerance for risk was low.

Had the person stayed invested during the market correction, the fund would have once again moved to positive territory.

For instance if you look at a one-year period ending September 29, the best performing Reliance Monthly Income Plan generated a return of 30 per cent while, for the same period FT India Monthly Plan (Bonus) lost 3.5 per cent.

This shows that before investing one has to evaluate the risk-taking capacity, perception and tolerance towards risk to accumulate money in an asset class such as equity.

Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/iw/2009/10/04/stories/2009100450350900.htm