Mutual fund folio numbers increases to 8 crore

Rising investors’ interest in mutual fund has led to an addition of nearly 77 lakh new folios in the first seven months of the current fiscal, taking the total to an all-time high of around 8 crore at the end of October. This follows an addition of 1.6 crore accounts in 2017-18 fiscal, over 67 lakh folios in 2016-17 and 59 lakh in 2015-16.

Folios are numbers designated to individual investor accounts, though an investor can have multiple accounts. According to the data from Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi) on total investor accounts with 41 active players, the number of folios rose to a record 7,90,31,596 at the end of October this year, up from 7,13,47,301 at the end March 2018, registering a gain of 76.84 lakh.

Over the last few years, investor accounts have increased following robust contribution from retail investors, especially from smaller towns and huge inflows in equity schemes.

Folios in equity and equity-linked saving schemes (ELSS) grew by 66 lakh to 6 crore. Besides, folios in balanced category surged by 4.4 lakh to over 63 lakh during the period under review. Further, folios in income funds rose by 5.6 lakh to 1.13 crore.

Overall, mutual funds have seen an inflow of over Rs 81,000 crore during April-October period of the current fiscal (2018-19), while equity schemes alone attracted an impressive inflow of over Rs 75,000 crore.

However, a net withdrawal of Rs 1.23 lakh crore was witnessed from income schemes — a type of debt mutual funds that deliver a steady income. Besides, gold ETFs continued to see a net outflow of Rs 290 crore.