29 new funds mop up Rs 4,654 crore in January 2015

Mutual Fund assets increase by 12.4%

 There seems to be no dearth of investors as far as new fund offerings (NFOs) by mutual funds are concerned.

According to the Association of Mutual Funds of India (AMFI) data, 29 new schemes were launched in January 2015 in which investors pumped in Rs 4,654 crore.

Of this, Rs 2,350 crore came from 21 income funds and Rs 2,284 crore came from seven equity schemes. Another Rs 20 crore came from an equity-linked savings scheme (ELSS).

As a result of this and also due to the interest in existing funds as well, the total assets under management of the mutual fund industry increased by 12.4 per cent (Rs 1.3 lakh crore) to Rs 11.81 lakh crore in January 2015 after witnessing 3.6 per cent fall by Rs 38,966 crore to Rs 10.51 lakh crore in December 2014.

Interestingly, gold exchange traded funds (ETF) and Fund of Fund (FoF) categories witnessed outflows during January, when all others had inflows.

Benchmark indices, which include the Sensex and the Nifty, had increased 6.49 per cent and 6.8 per cent respectively during January.

Mahindra CIE Automotive was the favourite pick among mutual funds when it came to investments during January. According to a report by IDBI Capital, mutual funds bought 44.23 lakh shares of Mahindra CIE totalling Rs 97.4 crore in January.

The next favourite was Poddar Developers (6.36 lakh shares bought for Rs 92.2 crore), followed by United Spirits (2.66  lakh shares bought for Rs 92.1 crore) and M&M Financial Services (29.06 lakh shares bought for Rs 74.1 crore).

GAIL (India) topped the list of exits by mutual funds in terms of market value during January. A total of 13.44 lakh shares of GAIL (India) worth Rs 59.8 crore were sold by MFs  in January.

TVS Motor Company was the second in the list (20.17 lakh shares sold for Rs  54.2 crore) followed by Petronet LNG (20.14 lakh shares sold for Rs 42 crore) and Hindustan Unilever (5.47 lakh shares sold for Rs 41.6 crore).