MFs see marginal rise in AUM

Despite a surging equity market, domestic mutual funds have only seen a marginal rise in their total assets under management (AUM) in December, according to figures from the Association of Mutual Funds of India.

The mutual fund (MF) industry has seen its total AUM rise to Rs 1,50,093.19 crore from Rs 1,49,836.50 crore in November end. Pru ICICI MF was the biggest gainer in absolute terms, adding Rs 2661 crore of AUM to end December at Rs 17,231 crore.

This makes it the largest private MF after UTI MF. UTI MF was the second biggest gainer in absolute terms, adding Rs 471 crore to end at Rs 20,976 crore followed by Canbank MF, which reported gains of Rs 370 crore to end at Rs 1,775 crore in December.

Pankaj Razdan, managing director at Pru ICICI Mutual fund said, "We were very focused in the last six months on re-working our strategy in terms of people and processes and this is a culmination of that effort. Better customer service delivery and wider has reach has helped us garner good inflows across products."

For December, the Benchmark MF was the biggest gainer of AUM in relative terms, with a 268 per cent (Rs 277 crore) surge in its AUM to Rs 380 crore, followed by Canbank MF (26.31 per cent), Escorts MF gained 20.38 per cent (Rs 25 crore) to end at Rs 145 crore, Pru ICICI MF AUM rose by 18 per cent and ING Vysya MF AUM rose by 11.20 per cent (Rs 140 crore) to Rs 1388 crore.

Rajan Mehta, executive director at Benchmark MF said, "Our recent IPO received a good response which helped us add AUM. Besides, the ETFs have also attracted investor interest."

BOB MF was the biggest loser of AUM in December, down 42 per cent (Rs 129 crore) to Rs 181 crore, followed by LIC MF, down 19 per cent (Rs 759 crore) to Rs 3161 crore, JM Financial MF saw its AUM drop by 19 per cent (Rs 734 crore) to Rs 3148 crore, Standard Chartered MF AUM was down 12 per cent (Rs 1157 crore) to Rs 8292 crore and Sahara MF saw its AUM fall by 9.20 per cent (RS 30 crore) to Rs 293 crore.

Market players said that despite a roaring equity market, the MF industry saw a marginal gain in AUM because of redemption pressure and a weak debt market. This has led to outflows in debt schemes. Equity MFs have seen record inflows and market gains but this has been almost nullified by outflows, fund managers added.