How was 2015 for your fund house?
We have started reaping the benefits of a few initiatives which we undertook earlier. In 2013, we introduced a philosophy called ‘Buy Right Sit Tight’ which is based on quality, growth, longevity and price (QGLP) and started focusing on developing expertise in equity funds. Both these initiatives have helped us grow our AUM in mutual funds and PMS.
However, the happiest moment of 2015 is getting widespread acceptance from a lot of distributors across the country.
Your fund house has witnessed a healthy growth in 2015. What worked in your favor and how do you plan to grow it further?
We are consistent in our communication. Typically, a relationship manager of an AMC changes his/her script every quarter. They promote different funds like arbitrage funds, capital protection funds or balanced funds to distributors at different points in time. However, whether Nifty is at 7400 or 9000, we always talk about long term wealth creation through equity.
We stick to our core competency. We have not launched any new funds in 2015. We offer only four actively managed equity funds. We sell what we believe in.
The industry capped upfront commission at 1% in 2015. However, we saw it coming long back. We always believed that all trail is a win-win for all stakeholders – investors, distributors and fund houses. In fact, all our funds are no load and only trail. We have paid very handsome trail commission to our distributors. Our consistency has helped us build trust among distributors.
To achieve long term growth, we will continue to focus on our ‘Buy Right Sit Tight’ philosophy. In order to sustain this growth, we will continue to focus on communicating clearly, stick to our core competency and follow our philosophy.
What kind of challenges did you face in2015 and how did you overcome them?
Many people invest in mutual funds based on past performance. And if you analyze history, the best performing funds change every year. This perception of investing in funds based on past performance needs to change. Thus, we believe in communicating the right philosophy to create long term wealth. We avoid selling based on performance.
Besides, pricing was a major issue in 2015. A few AMCs which did not adhere to the best practices guidelines on new commission structure affected our business. However, this issue has been resolved now.
What are the key learnings for you this year?
My key learning in 2015 is to focus on achieving long term growth. One should set one or two goals and start focusing on building strategies to achieve them. Having multiple goals creates distractions. However, if you have too many goals, you should prioritize them.
