Since last many years investors were aware of three key categories in equity funds, i.e Large-cap funds, Mid-cap funds and small-cap funds. However, SEBI has came up with a circular in October 2017 which changed the structure of the mutual fund industry.

Many investors while investing in the stock markets use various parameters before selecting a stock for the investment. Among all these parameters, the valuation is one of the key aspects for investors. In the case of mutual funds also investors should look into all the valuations keenly to understand the current situation of the mutual fund.

We hear a lot the disclaimer that all mutual fund investments are subject to market risk, then what does this market risk mean? Mark-to-market risk is what this disclosure is trying to warn about.

Many of the fund houses are coming up with the NFOs in the FMP category, that is, fixed maturity plans. In the month of July 2018, AMCs have launched more than 40 FMPs both in short and long-term tenure.

In the last few months, mutual fund investors have been witnessing the consistency in the losses from their mutual fund investment. You must have heard many times, of late, that the Indian markets are falling due to weak global cues or due to macroeconomic aspects. 

Double-digit returns in the longer term is what most mutual fund investors desire for. Mutual fund investments are meant for the long-term wealth creation and investors usually invest in the schemes for achieving long-term financial goals.

Recent market correction which has been an eye opener for the investors who were in the hallucination of bull run in the past couple of years and were expecting very high returns from the equity funds. In the recent past almost every category except IT has witnessed erosion in the returns.

To make the mutual fund investments more attractive and affordable, market regulator is aiming to push for digitalization. SEBI will take measures to bring cost-effectiveness by promoting go green initiatives through online transactions.

Indian mutual fund industry has registered an increase of the 8.62 lakh folios in the month of July 2018. This growth was led by the increased folios in the Liquid funds.

Investors were spooked by the recent market volatility which has led to negative returns. Things have turned investors more cautious which can be seen with the redemptions in the mutual fund. 

Every mutual fund investor is now aware of the SIP. Systematic investment plan (SIP) has now become the most favourite investment mode for investors.

With the huge volatility in the equity markets, many people are looking at debt funds as an investment option. But even the debt market seems to be volatile, currently. Also, RBI hiked its repo rate by 25 bps twice in the last two policy meets.

In the recent years, people are trending more towards MF investment rather than following the traditional investment options. But before investing one should always take care of the risks. That is one should always do some basic home work before investing and one should always link their investment with their financial goals.

In the past six months, the markets experienced both upswings and downslides. The roller coaster ride has triggered many investors to look at all the potential opportunities to reap returns.

In a volatile market, every investor is looking for good investment options to reap more and more returns. So post categorisation and reclassification of the MF schemes, SEBI has opened many doors for investment by introducing categories like balanced advantage fund.

With the rising interest rates FMPs form a good investment option. These investment options are able to deliver good returns in comparison to the traditional saving instruments. Let's explore fixed maturity plans (FMP).

Market regulator SEBI called up a meeting of mutual fund trustees on Wednesday. The meeting hauled up the independent trustees and ordered them to ensure high corporate governance standards. Independent trustees are considered to be the first level regulators for ensuring the corporate governance

For the mid-cap and small-cap indices, the year 2018 has not been as pleasant as we would like it to be. The boarder market indices Nifty Midcap 100 and Nifty Smallcap 100 have taken a major beating this year. These indices have fallen by 13% and 21%, respectively in the last six months.

The youngest bank listed on the Indian stock markets, Bandhan Bank had reported stellar quarterly results recently. The bank's Q1FY19 results witnessed an exceptional profit growth of 47 per cent yoy on the back of robust loan book growth.

In recent times, you might have heard that consumption story is a good bet, invest in these funds, pharma funds seems to be promising and what not. But what are these sectoral funds? And do they suit every investor?

The year of 2017 was the year of wealth creation for the investors, but the year 2018 is checking the patience of investors. Since the last six months, the markets have been witnessing a roller-coaster ride with weak global cues and other macroeconomic traps.

A series of swift changes have swept over the Indian mutual fund industry with the recategorization guidelines issued by SEBI

The Indian Rupee has been on a losing streak against the dollar, which is a point of worry for the domestic investors. Many investors are looking for potential opportunities and ways to reap returns in this environment.

The day of July 13, 2018 was when Sensex stepped pass another landmark to reach its new all-time high of 36,740 amid firm global cues and the recent fall in the crude oil prices.

Arbitrage funds have witnessed significant outflows in the month of June. AMFI data showed that Rs. 1,423 crore were pulled out from arbitrage funds, which is the largest outflow from the category in the current financial year.

In recent times, we see that the performance of the large-cap funds was a bit lower than the benchmark, although they are considered to be one of the safest options in the equity funds category. 

Post mutual fund categorisation, the portfolio of many mutual fund schemes have changed. This phenomenon has modified the product basket of the mutual fund industry. The best example of this is the change in the equity-oriented hybrid scheme which is now an aggressive hybrid fund.

Equity and balanced funds were very dear to the investors for the last couple of years. These funds have cheered many investors and have seen large inflow in the last year. But for the last few months, these funds have been witnessing a huge decline in their inflows.

Every mutual fund investor wants to move forward wisely in the current market situation. Each and every investor is trying to minimise their risk exposure and maximise and safeguard returns. For this investors are looking at various options available currently in the mutual fund industry.

All the mutual funds carry some basic types of risks, but this does not mean that investors should avoid investing. The basic risks that every investor faces in the world of investment are volatility, uncertain and credit risk.

Bagging high returns with minimum risk exposure is what most investors carve for. To address this investor demand, there are several products in the mutual fund market and arbitrage fund is one of the better-known investment options, with the lowest risk exposure.

Post SEBI’s circular, the hybrid schemes have been categorised under 6 subcategories. These categories have different approaches and investment styles. Let's look at how these categories are defined.

The recategorization of mutual funds has created many new fund categories. Under the equity funds, the schemes following contra, value and focused strategy have been categorised differently.

Recently, SEBI has recategorized balanced funds into three categories that is Aggressive hybrid funds, Balanced hybrid funds and Conservative hybrid funds. So investors should know the basic information that they must look into while investing in these mutual fund schemes.

If we see the performance of large-cap funds, more than 20 schemes are under performing their respective benchmark since the start of this year.

The direct plans are already a big hit with the HNIs (high networth investors) and institutional investors since their inception. Moreover, with an increased investment from small-town investors, the direct plans are emerging as the favourite choice for investment in mutual funds.

NFO is nothing but the first time subscription offer for a newly launched funds. The NFO’s are launched with an aim to raise the capital for the scheme by the fund houses.

Thematic funds are the funds whose objective is to reap optimal returns through investment in stocks which belong to a particular theme

Mutual fund investors are looking at various smart investment ideas to generate better returns. The mutual fund arena offers a wide basket of the choices to the investors of which quant funds are one of the lesser known funds.

Money market mutual fund are the open-ended schemes which predominantly invests in ultra-safe and high-quality liquid instruments like treasury bills, commercial paper, certificates of deposits and repurchase agreements, with having less than one-year maturity. The debt funds, fixed maturity plans and gilt funds are some of the options provided by money market funds.

Mutual fund investor who don’t want to take much risk usually looks at the debt funds as the safer investment avenues. Post categorisation and reclassification, the arena of debt funds have been revived. Out the debt fund basket, floater fund is one of the lesser known mutual funds.

Mutual funds subscriptions through SIPs contributed Rs. 7,304 crore in May 2018. This exceeds the April collection by more than 9 per cent. As per the latest AMFI data, in March, the total SIP accounts stood at 2.23 crore.

In the recent past, the mutual fund houses aligned their products to invest in the pharma sector. The sector which has seen a huge decline in the last couple of years is now a darling for the mutual fund houses. Recently, Mirae Assets and ICICI Pru announced new thematic schemes keenly focused on maximizing profits from the pharma sector stocks.

The Indian mutual fund industry offers various investment avenues to the investor. In the recent AMFI data disclosure, we have seen that the folios of the fund of funds have increased. So let us just explore these funds.

Being a mutual fund investor, if you are looking at the closed-ended fixed income mutual funds as the investment avenue you must know some pros and cons of these mutual funds.

Being a mutual fund investor, one should always know the investment avenues available in the mutual fund industry. India mutual fund industry has a vast choice of options available with different mutual fund houses for every type of investor.

With the increasing awareness and penetration, the MF industry is witnessing a huge elevation in its AUM as well as folios. The number of folios has grown by over 12 lakh in just one month to reach an all-time high of 7.35 crore at the end of May 2018.

Post SEBI’s circular about the categorisation and reclassification many of fund houses have now standardised the scheme structure to adhere to the new norms. With the implementation of these changes, now investors can look forward to standardizing the structure of funds within a particular category. 

Many of fund houses/ Asset Management Companies (AMCs) have started cutting commissions paid to distributors

During the month of May 2018, the mutual fund industry has witnessed net inflows of Rs. 16,710 crore in equity funds which include pure equity funds, balanced funds, ELSS and equity ETFs

Market regulator SEBI has ordered mutual fund houses to disclose the total expense ratio (TER) of each scheme under both direct and regular plans on a daily basis.

In the recent monetary policy review meet, RBI hiked repo rates by 25 basis points and adjusted the reverse repo rate under the LAF to 6 per cent. The marginal standing facility (MSF) rate and the Bank Rate is now 6.50 per cent.

The markets regulator SEBI has slashed the 'additional expense' charged by mutual funds. The additional expenses have been lowered to just 5 basis points, eyeing a further increase in penetration of mutual fund products among investors.

To determine the efficiency of the fund manager and the performance of the mutual fund, alpha is used. Alpha is a statistical tool which measures the difference between the actual returns and the expected returns of the fund.

How much cash should you be holding at any moment in time, this is a very debatable topic as it varies from individual to individual

The market regulator SEBI has taken one more step to develop the bond market. It has suggested uniform procedure to determine pricing of thinly and non-traded, traded non-convertible debt securities

Despite the poor performance of the S&P healthcare index and the underperformance of the pharma category some of the fund houses see this sector as an opportunity and are coming up with NFOs in this sector. 

In the last three months, benchmark index Nifty has remained flat, however, mutual fund schemes focused on PSU stocks have fallen around 3-10 per cent roughly. 

Continuous slide in the shares prices of Manpasand Beverages during the past three day have given worries to many investors. The mutual fund industry as a whole is impacted and returns of many schemes are hampered with this slide.

There are various strategies for allocating capital to different kinds of mutual funds. Let’s see some types of asset allocation strategies.

It is very important for the investor to decide where and how much money should be invested in various asset classes like equity, debts etc. This process is called asset allocation which is very important part of designing an investment portfolio.

The external value of Indian rupee (INR) is declining and is down by 6.9 per cent  against US Dollar, year till date. This has been one of the factor that has led to a fall in the Indian equity market. Nevertheless, this has a silver lining and you can invest in funds that invest in US-Focused funds that will help you reap good returns.

NFO that is new fund offering is the initial offer to the investors for subscription to a new mutual fund.

It takes a lot of analysis while making an investment decision. Ideally, even while exiting or redeeming an investment, an investor should thoroughly think and analysis why the scheme is underperforming. Moreover, investors should know when to redeem their investments.

With the increasing awareness and increasing interest of the investors many of the mutual fund houses came up with the NFOs with different themes.  Find the new fund offers currently open.

The small-cap and mid-cap themes which were the darling of the investors for the last couple of years are bleeding like anything now. The theme had served manifold returns to investors till the end of 2017. But the year 2018 dawned with huge challenges for these themes. 

Systematic investment plan of mutual funds is in highlights again. This time not with new highs but with SIP contribution registering a decline in the month of April 2018.

Accrual funds are the debt funds which hold the securities till their maturity. These funds primarily focuses on earning interest income from the coupon offered by the securities in their portfolio. 

Many a time, we wait for the festive season to buy our desired product. That is, we aim to own the same product with the same quality and same durability at a lower price as the festive seasons always comes up with discounts. Then why not do the same with your mutual fund investments, even in the investing world you can have the same approach.

Gilt funds are debt mutual fund schemes which invest predominantly in the government bonds, that is, government-issued bonds.

Post Union Budget 2018, the roller-coaster ride in the market have taught investors that nothing is going to be easy in the investment arena. To gain one need to take risks, but before that the investors should know the risks affecting their portfolio

Gone are the days of casually investing in mutual funds, today's investors need to know how to create a portfolio of funds and what are the strategies and approaches used to construct a portfolio. This article deals with the two basic approaches used to construct mutual fund portfolios.

While investing into mutual funds many a times you notice the word benchmark. But do we know what a benchmark is? Let's understand more about benchmark.

Offer document which is the core document for mutual fund investment is ignored by investors as they find it difficult to understand. But there are some must read aspects into the offer document which investor should look into before investing into the scheme. 

We often hear and read that, “Mutual fund investments are subject to market risk. Please read the scheme related documents carefully.” in multiple languages. But has anyone read it? Do we know what is an offer document and the key information memorandum (KIM)? What does it contain?

Investors usually spread investments across the asset classes to reduce risk. Debt funds are commonly used to cushion market volatility. Credit opportunity fund is a type of debt fund which although is not so popular among the investors is a good investment option.

Every investor wants his investment to outperform. The mutual fund arena is well-known for steady returns in the longer term. But it too needs some diligence and planning to achieve maximum returns.

A new fund offer (NFO) is the first time offer for subscription from newly launched fund. The new fund offers are launched to raise the capital in respect to buy the shares or securities or bonds for the fund from the market. These offerings work similarly to IPOs. 

Diversification is the key to reduce risk. To manage large investments efficiently, proper diversification among the various asset classes is very important. 

Investors usually invest into tax-saving funds at the end of the year that in the last 3-4 months of the financial year to receive a tax shield. Usually, tax-saving funds are utilised for the purpose of tax saving only. But these funds are also equity-linked and even they can reap better returns in the longer run.

International funds are the funds which invest in the foreign securities. These funds not only gave investors decent returns but also have some risks associated with them. Investors need to be aware of these factors while investing in international funds.

The Indian mutual fund industry has kick-started its new financial year with robust AUM growth. Despite of the volatility in the Indian equity markets, assets under management of the industry rose by 1.37 lakh crore to reach its all-time high of Rs. 23.25 lakh crore as per AMFI data.

The fastest growing Indian mutual fund industry offers various investment avenues to the investors. Multi-cap funds are one of them and stands as an unique offering. Multi-cap funds are diversified equity funds which invest across different market capitalization in varying proportion to meet the investment objectives.

As we know that liquid funds are very useful to create emergency funds or for the purpose of opting STP (Systematic Transfer Plan) into equity funds or to park money temporarily at any point of time, in the same way, another category of debt funds, that is, ultra short-term funds can be used for the same purpose.

The technology sector funds have made a solid come back in the last one month. The category has performed very well and registered an average return of 10.76 percent in the last one month.

In the current market conditions, investors are looking for various options of investment to override volatility. Mutual fund investors often use SIP’s, that is, systematic investment plans to minimise risks and losses. In the same way, STP, that is, systematic transfer plan can be a useful tool to tackle volatility.

Mutual funds have gained too much attraction in the last couple of years. The key reasons behind this are the returns provided by these funds and the increasing awareness about the same. 

The recent circular from the market regulator SEBI for the categorisation and rationalisation has created a fresh new basket for the equity mutual fund schemes. According to the circular, all open-ended schemes will be classified under broad categories like equity, debt, hybrid, solution-oriented and others 

Diversification is one of the most important things to focus on when you are investing in the mutual funds. The Indian mutual fund industry gives various options to investors, interval fund is one of these avenues which is lesser known

Many a time small things make a big difference in the end results. The phenomena can be observed closely in the world of investment. The best example for this will be expense ratio, which can make a lot of difference in returns from the mutual fund investment.

Contra fund is one such fund which investors can look for to diversify with a comparable exposure,the fund takes a contrarian view on the equities and invests into securities having cheap valuations, but rich balance sheet.

The funds which invest solely into the money market securities are money market mutual funds. These investments are short-term and very liquid investments.

Being a mutual fund investor, it is very important to balance your portfolio periodically. For this performance weighted strategy is one of the best suited strategy to reap higher returns

It has been a roller coaster ride for investors in the last few months. The sharp downfall in the Indian as well as global equity indices have eaten up the returns of investors. With such volatility many investors have switched to large-cap funds and stocks to safeguard their investment

Many of the mutual fund investors who have retired or are planning for a retirement usually seek the option of gaining a regular income from their investments to meet their day-to-day expenses.

With the increasing penetration and rising participation from small town investors the mutual fund SIPs have increased in the last fiscal. The data from AMFI shows that the retail investors are preferring SIP option for investing. 

Many investors use liquid funds as an option to park excess money for a short duration and to gain a decent yield. 

Market regulator SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) has tightened norms for the disclosure of the performance track record of the merged schemes. The move aims to standardize the performance disclosure of the schemes.

In the Union Budget 2018, Government of India reintroduced the Long term capital gain (LTCG) tax on the equity investments. From April 1, 2018, investors need to pay 10 per cent of LTCG on transfer of equity mutual funds having exposure of 65 per cent or more in equity or equity-related instruments.

Market regulator SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) has directed fund houses to re-categories the universe of their offerings in distinct and new categories specified by the SEBI. Under debt funds category, there are 16 sub categories under which the fund houses need to realign their existing schemes