Top funds that doubled investors' money in the past year

All of these funds have outperformed the BSE Sensex by a wide margin, as well as small- and mid-cap indices

Globally, the performance of a fund is measured against its respective country’s equity indices. If a fund manager is able to meet or beat the index performance s/he is considered to be a strong performer. By this yardstick, most of Indian fund managers can well be considered star performers.

Financial year 2014-15 has been good for the Indian markets having posted their biggest gain in the past five years with a return of nearly 25%. But there are two funds that have given nearly four times the index returns in the last one year.

Among funds with Assets Under Management (AUM) of nearly Rs 1,000 crore Sundaram SMILE Fund has given investors a return of 105.55% while DSP Black Rock Micro Cap Fund posted a return of 97.83%. In other words both these funds have doubled investors’ money over the last one year.

Sundaram SMILE has an AUM of Rs 920.33 crore while DSP Black Rock Micro Cap Fund has an AUM of Rs 1,837.99 crore. In fact Sundaram’s Select Micro Cap Series (closed ended fund) has given a return of nearly 120%, almost five times Sensex’s return. BSE small-cap index and mid-cap index during the year have given return of nearly 50%, twice that of the Sensex.

While Sundaram and DSP have been largely focused on smaller companies there are other funds that have a large company focus and have performed well. Birla Sun Life MNC Fund with an AUM of Rs 852.49 crore gave a return of 87.58% during the one year period. Franklin Build India Fund provided a return of 84.95% but has a smaller corpus of Rs 223.26 crore.

Asset Under Management (Rs crore) | Create infographics

Around 11 equity mutual funds have generated a return of over 80% in the past one year. But the performance has largely been dominated by mid- and small-cap funds.

Sector-specific funds have also had a good time in the market. UTI Transportation and Logistics Fund gave a return of 83.05% while SBI Pharma Fund has provided a return of 76.13%.

Those investors who have blocked their money in Tax Saving funds have reason to smile, too. IDBI Equity Advantage Fund and Reliance Tax Saver (ELSS) Fund have both generated returns of 70%.

Going forward, however, whether these funds will continue to outperform is anybody’s guess. The MF industry itself has a disclaimer that says past performances are not indicative of future performance of the schemes.