Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Equity MFs see worst fourth quarter

Equity funds, which are fast becoming the preferred investment vehicle for a substantially large population, have turned out one of their worst quarterly performances during the three-month ended March 31.

A study by Value Research, a firm that specialises in mutual fund industry research, showed that the average returns of almost all categories of equity funds had their worst three months since January 2001. Between January and March this year, funds belonging to the most popular 'diversified equity category', lost an average of 28.3%in value.

Individually, funds in the diversified category lost between 16.2% and 40.6% during the first three months of the current year while the Bombay Stock Exchange Sensex and the NSE Nifty both lost nearly 23%, the study by Value Research pointed out.

The recent study showed that of the 277 equity funds available in the market, only 35outperformed their respective indices while the rest 242 lagged. What's worse, of the 35 funds that beat their benchmarks, just seven managed to do so by a margin greater than 5%.

Read more in The Times of India article.

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