Birla Advantage Fund, the flagship equity scheme from Birla Mutual Fund, has increased its exposure to the software sector during the quarter July-September `99. As on September 30, the software sector had a weightage of 42.4 per cent in the portfolio, as
compared with 33.7 per cent during the earlier quarter.
At the same time, fund manager Bharat Shah has reduced his exposure to the FMCG and pharma sectors and added as many as 15 news scrips to the portfolio.
In the software sector, the fund manager has added five new faces: Fujitsu ICIM, Digital Equipment, Sierra Optima, Citicorp Securities and Subex Systems. At the same time, the fund has completely sold off its holdings in Wipro, Mastek, PSI Data Systems and SSI.
The fund has also increased its exposure to every single existing software scrip in its portfolio. While the sharp run at software counters resulted in the NAV of the scheme testing Rs 44 levels, the correction in these scrip has also resulted in a steep fall over the last couple of weeks.
According to market players, there is some apprehension about the third-quarter earnings of most software companies. This is on the back of a slowdown in software spending by leading corporates globally till the year 2000. This apart, most institutional players have been booking profits in software scrips due to the sharp appreciation over the last couple of months. All this has resulted in the NAV of the scheme coming under pressure of late.
However, players are of the view that the sector could witness fresh buying interest shortly as valuations have once again become attractive after the recent correction.
In the pharma sector, the fund has
