For Whom Wealth Matters
July 13, 2011 6 Comments
Here is a power point presentation dating from Rakesh Jhunjhunwala’s 11 Aug 2007 meeting with IIT -Mumbai students.I happened to find it by chance today.And it’s still worth a read.When you have a spare 15 minutes do flip through the presentation.
July 11, 2011 3 Comments
MIPs are hybrid debtoriented mutual fund products.They are great places to park money if you have a 2-3 year horizon.The majority of the money in this case is invested in debt and the NAVs fall when the interest rates rise.Currently the equity markets are showing some weakness and the interest rates are high,so MIP NAVs are low.So its a good time to pick up MIPs .HDFC and Reliance are 2 fund houses that are known for their treasury management operations.And HDFC and Birla Sun Life MIPs have perfomed well due to superior management of the equity component.
Here is a video that walks you through the ABCs of MIPs:
July 10, 2011 3 Comments
Here is a video laying out the pros and cons of investing in liquid and liquid plus funds vs FDs.Where you invest will depend on the guarantees you seek,the amount you wish to deposit,the interest rate scenario in future,prevailing interest rates,tax liabilities,the use you wish to put your cash to in future etc.Do watch the video before you decide either way.
Personally I have found that sometimes you get short term FDs that offer better rates for senior citizens than the mutual funds.And the most important takeaway from the video is that FDs can be used to lock in high rates in a falling interest rate scenario.
July 10, 2011 1 Comment
Mutual fund schemes known as liquid funds /money market funds/cash funds and ultra short-term bond funds/liquid plus funds are options for parking funds for the short term.They allow for a high degree of liquidity.They are alternatives to keeping money in a savings bank account or a short term bank fixed deposit.
Liquid funds invest in money market instruments of residual maturity up to 91 days.Liquid funds have the lowest volatility in returns among all categories of mutual funds because there is there is no mark-to-market (MTM) valuation of the portfolio on a daily basis unless there is a trade in the secondary market in the underlying security .Practically there is no trade in money-market instruments and valuation of daily NAV happens on an accrual basis, i.e., by adding the coupon accrued for the day without any mark-to-market impact. Read more of this post
July 10, 2011 2 Comments
Mutual funds are largely retail investment products.They are more suitable for saving money rather than make it grow at astonishing rates.They are largely targeted at middle class investors.However wealthy investors too continue to invest in mutual funds.The advantages of getting professional investment management and not having to deal with researching stocks , trading and tracking a portfolio is too much to give up. However mutual funds investing exclusively in small cap companies are not very popular with more sophisticated investors.This is because mutual funds are not the best way to invest in small cap companies.
Consider this: There are 62 funds in Value Research’s Mid and Small Cap category. Of these, no more than six are either exclusively or primarily focused on small-cap stocks. These funds have had a patchy performance with a large amount of volatility and have been unable to give attractive returns even over relatively long periods of time. Of course, volatility is a given in any small cap portfolio because smaller companies tend to react violently to any change of mood. However, the whole idea is that the investment manager will eventually be able to build a decent base of investments in a set of small-cap companies that are on their way to growing out of the category and into being mid-cap companies. Here lies the problem. If a knowledgeable and expert investor were to do this directly, he would probably identify a handful of companies and then would slowly build positions in them.
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