Mutual Fund industry assets up by 9.5%

The Indian Mutual Fund industry is on front foot once again. The industry’s assets under management (AUM) have risen by about 9.5% in Jan ’09 vis-à-vis Dec ’08. This is the second consecutive monthly rise in the AUM after a series of downfalls witnessed in the last quarter of 2008. Earlier the assets had risen by around 5% in Dec ’08.
With an asset base of Rs 4,60,949 crore, the industry may still have a long way to go to regain its highest absolute peak ever of Rs 6 lakh crore. However, in percentage terms, this rise is pretty significant as growth in January ’08 is second highest after Oct ’07. In last 15 months, growth in AUM has been over 10% on only two occasions.
LIC Mutual Fund is once again the biggest AUM gainer in percentage terms. Its assets are up by over 30% since last month to Rs 18,731 crore. This AMC had earlier reported a rise of over 23% in AUM for the month ended Dec ’08.
Other asset management companies (AMC) to have recorded significant rise in assets include IDFC, DWS Investments, Birla Sun Life, Tata, Principal, ICICI Prudential and Kotak. Each of these AMCs has recorded an increase of over 10% in their AUM.

While Reliance continues to be the largest player of the industry with an asset base of Rs 76,168 crore, followed by HDFC at Rs 51,420 crore, there has been a re-shuffling for the third position. ICICI Prudential has once again overtaken UTI to be the third largest fund house of the country. It has reported an increase of about 13.5% in its AUM which currently stands at Rs 47,515 crore against UTI’s 46,161 crore.

Source:http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Personal_Finance/Mutual_Funds/MF_News/Mutual_Fund_industry_assets_up_by_95/articleshow/4070266.cms