Volatility fails to stop retail inflows into MFs
Retail investors continue to invest in equity mutual funds despite volatile market conditions. In April, they invested `15,890 crore in mutual funds.
However, flows turned positive in equity oriented hybrid schemes at `7,240 crore compared to outflows worth `3,603.61 crore in March indicating investors trying to take less riskier bets by investing in schemes that invest in both equity and debt instruments.
The mutual fund industry’s assets under management rose to over `38.03 lakh crore as on April 30,
2022 compared to over
`37.56 lakh crore in March
2022.
Systematic investment plan or SIP investments dipped by `464.82 crore to
`11,863.09 crore compared to `12,327.91 crore in March. Inflows into passive investment instruments such as Gold ETF, Index ETF and Other ETFs remained high at
`15,887.74 crore compared to `19,404.76 crore in March. Gold ETF attracted inflows of `1,100.37 crore compared to `205.15 crore in March.
“The lower quantum of net inflow from the previous month could be attributed to investors going
slightly cautious with their investments given the ongoing challenges to the investment environment. This is evident from a comparatively lower quantum of funds mobilised in April compared with March,” said Himanshu Srivastava, associate director, manager research, Morningstar India.
“Passively managed funds continue to attract
significant investor interest,” Srivastava added.
Inflows in income/debt oriented schemes turned positive at `54,756.60 crore compared to `1,14,823.77 crore outflow in March on account of corporates withdrawing money at the end of every quarter.
“It has been a good start to the new fiscal — FY23 — with net flows for overall mutual funds schemes in the positive territory and continued positive equity flows for consecutive 12 months. Despite market volatility in April 2022, retail investor trust on the mutual fund asset class continues to be strong, as reflected by the 36 per cent yoy rise to an alltime high retail AUMs,” said N.S. Venkatesh, the chief executive officer of AMFI.