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  • MF News SEBI to discuss distributor commissions with AMFI next month

    SEBI to discuss distributor commissions with AMFI next month

    SEBI Chief said that the market regulator has received some proposals on commission structure of distributors.
    Nishant Patnaik Jul 27, 2018

    SEBI held a meeting with independent trustees of mutual funds at Mumbai today. Ajay Tyagi, Chairman, Madhabi Puri Buch, Whole Time Member and other senior SEBI officials attended the meeting. More than 80 independent trustees participated in the meeting.

    In a TV byte after his meeting with AMCs trustees, SEBI Chairman Ajay Tyagi has said that the market regulator will discuss the commission structure of distributors with AMFI next month.

    Tyagi said that the market regulator did not have discussion on distributor commission with trustees. He said that the industry has taken a lot of reforms to rationalize Total Expense Ratio (TER) and commission structure and some proposals on these issues are under consideration.

    Earlier this month, SEBI has asked AMFI to ensure adherence to the best practices circular in letter and spirit. In fact, the market regulator has asked AMFI to chalk out a roadmap to ensure that fund houses adhere to the best practices circular.

    Talking about the meeting with trustees of AMCs, he said, “Mutual fund is a very good story. In fact, the AUM of the MF industry has doubled in the last four years. This is very significant industry, almost 20% of the banking industry. To sustain this growth, there is a need to have a good governance system in place. The role of trustees being critical, it was considered important to reach out to the independent trustees of mutual funds, to interact with them, sensitize them on the significant role played by them and seek their feedback.”

    Sources privy to this meeting told Cafemutual that SEBI has asked trustees to increase their involvement in the corporate governance practices of AMCs. Also, the market regulator highlighted 25 irregularities that they found during inspection carried out between April 1, 2014 and March 31, 2016. Cafemutual has done stories on these irregularities. Click on operational irregularities and non compliance with investment norms to know more about these irregularities.

    Apart from the interactive session, discussions were held on issues like role of trustees, investor relations, technological advancements, etc.

     

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    28 Comments
    Monilkumar · 5 years ago `
    Sebi must consider commision structure of distributors with other products.Must increase it according to inflation rate,but sebi drives with revers gear only.Before few years rate was 3-6%, now a days its around
    0.30-0.50,% only. Is it correct? Fees base model with deffinately impact Aum of the industry because of direct & online options.
    So what will distributor earn in future.Secondly if sebi object to earnings of distributors,please stop AMFI exam & dnt issue new licence.Its a waste of time ,enegy of new guys.
    JAYANTA · 5 years ago `
    When a proposal has come regarding reducing the expense ratio....why all eye's fell down to the distributors commission ????? Knowing that the majority Collections and Contribution are comming from the amfi certified distributors.I can challenge, If all distributor will left the mutual fund business.... market and industry will see the horribleness.My Earnest request please think and view about the Future of distributors.
    KUNDAN SRIVASTAVA · 5 years ago
    KINDLY REQUEST TO SEBI IF ALL BUSINESS COMES BY NATIONAL DISTRIUTOR, BANK,DIRECT .......MODE ,CANCELLED ALL ARN NUMBER ......ITS ONLY LABOUR OF NORMAL DISTRIBUTER WHICH TEACHES INVESTERS AT GROUND LABEL BUT IT CAN NOT SEE ANYONE .....NO AMC,NO AMFI,NO SEBI ???????????
    Reply
    Shashi puri · 5 years ago `
    Last year i have started my mf business ,but now i think i did a mistake by choosing this field , instead of encouraging distributers they are doing such things , ridiculous ,compare our commission structure with life insurance first year structure , we cant even buy peanuts with that , sad ,dont wana continue if this happens .
    Sameer bhargava · 5 years ago `
    MF business is not for new entrants who wants to make it as a carrier . Even for the existing ones 20% income has been reduced , when AMFI is promoting direct options in TV Advt’s than one can imagine that this industry has been closed for distributors and advisors . Appreciable is the stand point of insurance companies who value distributors .
    vivek badera · 5 years ago
    Why sebi is so much worried about 50-60 paisa of distributors commission. .they are just killing distributors in name of regulations .
    .does not think about people who r in this business. .!
    It's their future plan to remove comission as well distributors from industry..!,
    get ready for alternative business. !!
    Reply
    RAJESH KWATRA · 5 years ago `
    I feel SEBI should follow the IRDA where's in spite of lot of recommendation by several committees about the reduction in commission , IRDA has not taken any step for the benefit of advisor and this prompt distributer to work more for insurance companies.
    Prashant · 5 years ago `
    Haha...SEBI and AMFI will meet and decide our commissions. No distributor representative in this meeting. Is this not malicious? One regulator who wants to maximise company's profits is meeting with their lobby to understand how it can help them to do so without having even one representative of the people who gets affected by it the most. Who is AMFI(a lobby) to decide how much we should earn?
    Devaraj · 5 years ago `
    I feel MF commissions is amongst the least in financial services. Inspite of this SEBI is asking AMC, s to reduce TER and extensive campaigns on Direct Business is certainly going to make MF Distribution perish soon. Wake up SEBI and AMFI and protect us
    Srinivas · 5 years ago
    Really good
    Reply
    Arup Kumar Mukherjee · 5 years ago `
    Yes, Mutual Fund is a very good story and the distributor give there absolute efforts to do advising business for the investor. In the rural sector still there is lot of negativity about this investment , in lue of that we the amffi distributors give there for most effort to make himself/herself to continue there family,children education, old aged parents expenses, the health related hudge expenses. After all this , the authorities going to decrease expense ratio frequently and in this process we the distributors are the first choice to decreaseing there brokerage at first step. We have no pension, no retirement benefit. If the investor keep his/her investment alive in the fund we get trall commission from that.
    In this circumstance please looking to the distributor's interest are the foremost priority of the respective authority. So don't decrease the brokerage as well as trail commission frequently in the future.
    This is an utmost prayer to the authoriti on the behalf of me and all the individual IFA's of India. Please give us an opportunity to live life with our loveable family as we are not any remuneration at the end of every month.
    Thanks and regards.
    Vivek · 5 years ago
    Yes sir u r said rightly. AMFI should think about us. We are distributing mutual funds of AMC's to investor as per their needs & goals, we also daily care about investors investment, if their return they see negative first they asked to us not to AMC's & they are reducing commission day by day so how can we survive. Please think on it.
    Reply
    RAHUL · 5 years ago `
    Why SEBI is not doing anything for Mutual Fund Distributors. The commission structure of Insurance Agents is far from Mutual Fund Distrib, why SEBI is not making same rule for Insurance agents, why all eyes on Mutual Fund Distributors, now Mutual Fund Distributors will have to do something, so that we can get what we deserve...... 2nd option is insurance agents must come under same rule of mutual fund distributors.///////////??????????????
    G S Murthy · 5 years ago `
    Namaste,

    Review of regulations periodically is very much welcome. If the members of SEBI and AMFI are of the opinion that the brokerages are very high, i wish to draw their attention to National Distributors and Individual distributors. If you observe that commissions paid to distributors are running into few thousands of crores, understand that around 85% to 90% of the commissions are being paid to Institutions like BANKS and other major NATIONAL DISTRIBUTORS and a small share is for Small individual distributors.

    If SEBI AND AMFI are very concerned about the well being of the mutual fund customers please reduce the brokerages to BANKS AND NATIONAL DISTRIBUTORS and spare small time IFA's.

    Indian Mutual Fund investors do not pay fees or crib to pay when their portfolios shows negative returns even when the markets are not performing. Markets have not delivered returns for past 8 to 10 months, in such a scenario asking for fees after reviewing the portfolio is very difficult.

    Request you to consider these observations for the INDUSTRY to run in a healthy way.
    MK · 5 years ago `
    Dear SEBI & AMFI,

    Please don't kill distributors in bits & pieces, its very inhuman & painful. Grow Up, Show your Mettle and do it at once.

    Immediately Close all the commissions payable to distributors and let distributors find their alternative businesses.

    Why are you luring distributors to stay in your pond, when you hate them and you hate them the most.
    MAYUR KULKARNI · 5 years ago
    Respected SEBI/AMFI Members ,

    Do you really think reduction of TER & Commission structures will help investors ?

    Well it is actually reverse.

    If TER & Commission Structures are reduced further, lot of distributors will migrate to alternative like Insurance Distribution or Equity Broking.

    In either ways, investors will be at loss because in Insurance investors will get lower interest/bonus rates and in Direct Equity there is always risk of irrecoverable capital erosion of small & marginal investors and most of the time it gets eroded.

    On the other hand presence of well paid and well trained distributors ensures protection of investors interest at large, by spreading proper financial information to grass root level of retail investors.

    For instance, Entry Load was eliminated in 2009, also by the same time commissions payable to post office agents was reduced by postal department, which resulted in drastic fall in upfront commission and also drastic fall in number of distributors.

    However if we analyse the data we will find that most of Ponzi Schemes in India, like Sarada Chit Fund Kolkata, Perls Agro Tech, Rose Valley Chit Fund, DSK DL Pune. KBC Group Nasik, Samruddha Jeevan Maharashtra, collected there maximum money/investment mostly after 2009.

    There are still many Ponzi Schemes in real estate sector, where investors are fighting legal battles to recover there money.

    Had there been sufficient number of distributors operating in the market, taking proper information & investment options to investors, the overall spread and intensity of these scams would have been much much lesser.

    Obstinacy on the part of regulators to save few hundred crores of upfront commission, infact caused a loss of many Billiion rupees to common Indian Investors, and many of them had lost their lifetime of savings.

    Vinamra Gharat · 5 years ago
    Totally agree with you sir!
    Reply
    s murali subramanian · 5 years ago `
    a wise move to eliminate ifas
    siva · 5 years ago `
    it hurts to new ppl taken as a profession
    Ratnesh · 5 years ago `
    Make TER to 1% for equity, 0.5 for debt. reduce fund management charge as well as brokerage charge, make TER below direct plan and make only one plan too much plan make confusion amongst investors, name shold common for all fund like
    SBI equity
    Reliance equity
    Hdfc equity

    No necessary to mention regular-direct

    Fund manager charge should 0.4
    Brokerage 0.4
    For all expance 0.2
    We should talk about investors not for self always. We never satisfy , when we getting 50k brokerage it's less, when getting 1 lac still it less, when will get 2 lac still would be less.
    Vinamra · 5 years ago `
    I have assumed that I will be getting 0% upfront and 0.50% trail on equity and 0.20% trail on debt. Anything above this is bonus. I am not expecting much from commissions now a days. I started 8 months ago! If an IFA is expected to get less brokerage, so should the AMC managers! They should not charge more than 0.75% on any of their products!
    prahlad das khatod · 5 years ago `
    Dear sir,
    I am agree with all above. we have nothing in our hand. we can request about our geniune demand to sebi & Amfi i.e. we should be paid for services we are giving to investors. It is correct after withdrawal of entry load in 2009, mentioned about upfront commission to be payable by investor to distributor in the same circular. But in India 9 years has passed no fees/upfront commision is paid by investor even than investor was getting more than Double tax free return in comparision to other sources of deposit. sir, we were not selling only MF Products, we were also educating to investors who do not know about MF. Sebi, AMFI should not forget the role played by distributors towards MUTUAL FUND SAHI HAI. Today a common man knows about mf whether he invest or not.

    Last I want to draw your kind attention towards deceased case. without help of distributors It is not
    easy to get the amount say for ladies, widows, service class, senior citizens. No body knows the formalities in case of deceased. This problem is big where there is no nominee/second holder.
    only Individual IFA is helpful in such cases, who runs between Investor legal heir and Amc. there is no upfront or trail for deceased cases. There is no provision of online deceased claim settlement like
    online MF sale. BY this my little request to sebi, amfi I request to make a system for remuneration
    for Indian individual IFAS who are devoting their time 24x7 . Thanks
    K devi · 5 years ago
    Really true and infact the most important aspect , Mr Khatod has rightfully mentioned.
    The practice of distribution is just not only selling of mf schemes and earning brokerage out of it.
    This indeed very noble and selfless exercise by educating thousands of new or existing investors about the avenue, providing various services during the investment, keeping a close watch on the growth or degrowth of the funds, and especially at the time of deceased settlement.
    I have a experience of working with banking institution, where it used to be a nightmare for a client to get through with such occassion.
    We distribitors in other place always help them relentlessly during such period of need.
    With this practice we not only helping amc s to get big AUMs but also we are always in the side of the customers first.
    Whatever way the current scenario is geting digitalised, a human touch is inevitable.
    Getting personalised service is every investors dream. I personally have experienced that the same kind of gesture is not profound with big institutions like banks.
    They just are good in feeling forms whenever they have a instruction to advertise particular scheme of a particular Fund house. Once thats done, investors sometimes have to cry for even a single statement of account. Portfolio management and servillence is a far dream.
    Large institutes either have their own AMCs or they have targets and log in days for various specific schemes of some other AMCs. They are least botgered about the need of the investor.
    Being the custodian of their money, bank people know how much fund one customer have in his or her account. Very easily they achieve their log in day targets.
    But all this practices which actually happening inside big institutions ultimately breach the customers investment intentions.
    But we the individual distributors are far from that kind of practices. And that is very much true.
    AMFI and SEBI should look into this very important aspect.
    As in long run , if this continues, investor will lose trust upon MF investment.
    Therefore, to keep the entire Individual distributor fraternity in tandem, they need to give a rethought to this entire COSTING matter.
    Their action today will decide the future of not only individual distribitors but also to the entire MF market.
    As investment is not only an agreement , its also a platform of trust and bonding amongst distributors and investors
    Reply
    Subhasish · 5 years ago `
    In Dec 2018 I started working as a IFA, the first ifa in my pincode area. After few month I realised that only very few % of people have heared about mutual fund, 90% people don't know that what is mutual fund!!!
    You can guess the situation ... What's are trending in villages of India, and sebi and amfi now planning to reduce distributors commission in cold AC room in Mumbai.
    Pls try to understand that the effort we are giving to our investors for their behalf is very much important for the maximum mf penetration. And what we are getting..!!! Only 0.3 - 0.5%... Pls try to understand that this is too little to run our family.
    Even sometime my bike petrol cost is higher than commission.
    Not to see only big distributors... Need attention in villages and small town.,, Where people think that mf is too much risky and likely a cheat fund...!
    So request again to consider mf commission . Should increase.
    Sanjay kapoor · 5 years ago `
    IFA IS VERY POORLY PAID YOU CANT RUN YR KITCHEN ON MF COMMISSION
    Sanjay kapoor · 5 years ago `
    IFA IS VERY POORLY PAID YOU CANT RUN YR KITCHEN ON MF COMMISSION
    Ashwinikumar · 5 years ago `
    Dear Sir ,
    I would like to say if you think about distributor is shut down your business ..then why this type of Rules comes in to existence..finally all is in your Hand..
    You stop issuing new Arn card ..and also cancelled of all existing Arn No ..also ..
    Then your problem is solved ..then you free to take such type of decision ..like ..
    No expenses,no exit load ,no entry load ..no commission..
    You free to advertise ..on media ,social media ...ki
    MUTUAL FUND SAHI HAI ..
    I request to you pls think about distributor..ki uska carrier kaha per hoga ..??
    How make a carrier in this field..
    I think all rules are making only for MF IFAS ..No any other industry..??
    Every time ..any movement..
    You think ke
    Distributor suicide kar lena chahiye ..??
    So pls you make onetime Rules passed for life long...neither will come one time ..when Advisior take decision only one option ..
    I.e.sucide only .
    Think seriously..

    ABHISHEK SURANA · 5 years ago `
    REDUCING COMMISSION MEANS INCREASING POORNESS & UNEMPLOYMENT OF DISTIBUTORS. GOVT. INCREASING THERE EMPLOYEES' SALARY & FACILITY ON A GREAT % RATE WHY ? AND REDUCING DISTRIBUTORS' BROKERAGE WHO BEAR ALL CONCERN EXPENSES TO SELL MUTUAL FUND..HOW CAN SURVIVE ON THIS TYPE OF LOW STRUCTURE..NOW AUM OF MF HAS INCREASED IN IMPRESSIVE FIGURE OF ALL AMC THAN TRYING TO KILL DISTRIBUTORS FOR THERE GREAT WORK..AUTHORITIES ARE MAKING POOR & WEEK TO ME & ALL DISTRIBUTORS..I STRONGLY OPPOSE TO REDUCING BROKERAGE.
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