Sunday, April 30, 2006

Mutual funds and stock valuation

Its often a good idea to see what mutual funds are buying or selling these days. This helps you predict stocks which have a higher propensity of taking the dive or perhaps, soar the skies. I used MutualFundsIndia to list the top 4 performing funds over the last 3 months .. here's their list -
1. Deutsche Alpha Equity Fund - 37.35% in last 3 months
2. Sundaram Select Mid-cap Fund - 33.10% in last 3 months
3. SBI Magnum Comma Fund - 32.90% in last 3 months
4. Franklin India Opportunity Fund - 32.10% in last 3 months

Now, I guessed that the portfolio composition of all these 4 funds would tend towards parity or perhaps, a high correlation. If not companies, atleast the sectors. Here news -
1. Deutsche Alpha - Diversified (29%); Computers (9%); Metals (8%) ... top 3 cos: Sterlite (8%); Tata Steel (8%); Tata Chemicals (7%)
2. Sundaram Midcap - Engineering goods (17%); Housing (11%); Auto & ancillaries (11%) ... top 3 cos.: Kalpataru (4%); Balrampur Chini (4%); Ansal (3%)
3. SBI Magnum - Cement (14%); Diversified (13%); Metals (12%) ... top 3 cos: Hindustan Zinc (8%); Shree Cement (7%); United Phos (5%)
4. Franklin - Entertainment (22%); Auto & ancillaries (14%); Diversified (11%) ... top 3 cos: TVS Motors (9%); Jaiprakash (7%); Calcutta Electric Supply Co. (7%)

Amazingly ...
i) The top three sectors among the four top performing funds is strewn over 8 different industries (from a max:12)
ii) The top 3 holdings of each of the 4 funds is different i.e. we have 12 different companies that form the top 3 holdings of these 4 funds.
iii) The average holding in equities from the total corpus is a healthy 94%. (so you might want to rethink your idea of staying 60% in cash and rest in equity)

Mutual funds donot think alike and have different priorities and basis of evaluating stocks. For us the advantage is in identifying changes in portfolio in mutual funds to understand what they are buying or selling, researching the same and arriving at a decision.

PS: Has anyone checked the Calcutta Electric ... ???

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