Three respected CEOs of the mutual fund industry - Sunil Subramaniam, MD, Sundaram MF, Kailash Kulkarni, CEO, L&T MF and Ashutosh Bishnoi, MD & CEO, Mahindra MF – emphasized at CIFA 2020 the the importance of finding niche to turbo charge their business.
Here are some key highlights of the event:
Prashant Jain, ED & CIO, HDFC MF
Topic - Is value investing gone for good?
PSUs are available at attractive valuation
Superior results do not come from buying high quality assets, but from buying assets for less than they are worth
Sunil Subramaniam, MD, Sundaram MF
Topic - Niche vs Mass: Narrow your focus to grow your business
Focussing on a niche client segment will help MFDs grow at a healthy pace
MFDs need to present themselves as a brand
Sanjay Sapre, President, Franklin Templeton Investments
Topic - Managing your reputation
Identity is what people say about you when you are in the room. And reputation is what people say about you when you leave the room
For identity and reputation to be the same, building your brand is the key
Srikanth V J Tanikella, Chief Operations Officer, CAMS
Topic - Technology and the future of distribution
With 50% of new investors being millennials, delivering a digitally powered service is the only way
MFDs must look to plug and play solutions such as customer on-boarding using eKYC and catbots for self-service
Vivek Kaul, Economist & Author of 'The Easy Money' trilogy
Topic - Overcoming behavioural barriers to generate optimal returns
MFDs need to find creative ways to deal with behaviour barriers of clients
Kailash Kulkarni, CEO, L&T MF
Topic- Simple yet effective marketing lessons from top producers
Cut out noise
Pitch products, which you have belief in
Focus on niche segment
A. Balasubramanian, MD & CEO, Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC Limited
Topic - My learnings from the market over 25 years
In Indian markets neither good nor bad phase lasts for too long
So, the key to accumulate wealth is spend time in the market
Dhruv Mehta, President of FIFA
Topic- Reinventing your business model
To be able to manage multi generation wealth, MFDs need to plan their succession well
K K Bajaj, Chairman, Bajaj Capital
Topic - Meri Udaan (My journey)
Being innovative and patience is the key to success
I started giving advertisement to meet clients at my office. This was a time when everyone used to meet clients at the clients home
Ashutosh Bishnoi, MD & CEO, Mahindra MF
Topic - Build your offer (Value proposition)
In a crowded commoditized market, differentiate your proposition by these three mantras: Tangible, Tactile and Touch
Find your client segment
Identify a pain point unique to your niche. Offer a solution to a pain point for a specific response
Make yourself easier to find by setting up a website, having social media presence and writing blogs
P V Subramanyam, Subramoney
Topic - Blogging for Distributors
Blog on topics you think you have a good hold
If you are not good at writing, you can hire someone to covey your ideas through the blog
Anjali Bhagwat, Indian rifle shooter
Topic - Develop self-belief and conquer the world
Anjali’s success mantra: Set realistic goals, work hard and remain disciplined
Mental training helped me become the world number one
Venugopal Mangat, Head - Equities, L&T MF
Topic - Equity outlook
Four drivers of recovery would be rural economy, exports, real estate and asset quality cycle
Chasing short-term performance is risky. For instance, BSE Small Cap Index returned +58% in 2017 vs -24% in 2018
So, focus on chalking out a long-term plan.
Rajan Pathak, Co-Founder, Fintso
Topic- Innovative strategies to scale your practice
Diversify across products such as insurance, PMS, AIF and so on
Widen your reach across geographies, leverage technology and focus on core strength
Anoop Bhaskar, Head - Equities, IDFC MF
Topic - Investment Style, an added dimension to your investment allocation strategy
Top 10 performers in the multi cap category has an average of around 40% exposure to top 10 stocks in Nifty
Diversification based on investment style (growth, value) and market cap is imperative
Nimesh Chandan, Head - Investment Equity, Canara Robeco MF
Topic - Narratives, Herding and Reflexivity
Narratives lead to herding and herding breaks diversity of views
Less diversity leads to market bias in a particular direction
Positive biases lead to rising stock prices and rising stock prices reinforce positive biases; the reverse also holds true
D.P. Singh, ED & CMO, SBI MF
Topic - Getting more assets from existing clients
Become a holistic financial solution provider. Clients have more than one need
There is a huge opportunity to use analytics and insights to cross sell solutions to existing clients
Moreover, Sunil Subramaniam, MD, Sundaram MF interacted with four inspiring MFDs. One of them was Rushabh Desai, a GNE Myopathy patient, who has overcome all odds in life to become a successful MFD. Second one was Swami Gowda, a perfect example of rags to riches story. Third on the list was Azeem Jagani, who spoke about how to manage celebrities’ money. Last in the line-up was Shanmugam, who is a successful MFD himself and trains other MFDs about client behaviour.
Besides, there were two rounds of ‘Express Talks’ where the likes of Gajendra Kothari, Pratibha Girish, Vinayak Sapre and Viresh Patel shared their ideas on a range of topics.
CIFA 2020 ended on an entertaining note with famous stand-up comedian Vipul Goyal taking the audience for a laughter ride.
