Escorts Mutual Fund is one of the oldest AMCs in India. It has a credible and trusted brand name. The fund house has small focused schemes.
However, we suffer from low visibility on account of no print and electronic media advertising. We don't have beta funds, sectoral funds and FMPs. Also, the regulatory framework tends to believe that small is not beautiful.
Challenges ahead
Maintaining investor confidence in mutual funds as a saving vehicle in the wake of volatility in equity markets and fallout of recent negative publicity regarding quality of debt papers would be one of the biggest challenge in the year ahead. Investors should take a well-informed call on the basis of actual data rather than assuming that all debt funds have toxicity.
Moderation of return expectations would be another challenge. Widening of distribution reach and finding a good talent pool would be big challenges. Moreover, it has been quite challenging to find quality investments, both in debt and equity markets. Generating alpha would be tougher if more money flows into equities as the investment universe is relatively smaller from mutual fund perspective.
Competition
In our opinion there should be no restriction in terms of entering the business and competition should be encouraged. Competition will force innovation and will help investors and the industry.
Retail reach
There is a target to increase the reach by 20 per cent per annum. In the long term, we target to cover a large number of small towns, with a potential to reach at least one lakh retail clients within five years.
This article was originally published on December 15, 2015.
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