MFs file papers with Sebi for 100 new offerings in 2015

With rising demand from retail investors for mutual fund (MF) schemes, the draft papers by fund houses filed with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) for launching New Fund Offers (NFOs) have gone as high as 100 since January.

The documents for these 100 NFOs have been with Sebi since the beginning of this year.

Some of these NFOs have already been launched, while other schemes would be opened for subscription soon after getting the necessary clearances.

UTI MF, Axis MF, ICICI Prudential MF, Birla Sunlife MF, and SBI MF are among the fund houses that are offering NFOs to investors.

A large number of these schemes are aimed at investment in equity and equity-related securities. Besides, the schemes are focused on debt fund, hybrid fund and Fixed Maturity Plan.

Manufacturing, economic recovery, resurgence of the business cycle, e-commerce and retirement, are some of the themes that are attracting mutual fund houses.

According to market participants, fund houses are rushing to Sebi to launch new schemes with growing interest among retail investors for mutual fund schemes. Recent fund launches have also received good response from investors.

Also, they said that the NFO market has picked up as the investors' confidence about equity markets is back and participation from retail investors is also on upswing.

In the past one year, several funds gave more than the index returns. This has brought retail investors' interest back into equities and they started participating through mutual funds, market participants added.