Welcome to Mutual Fund Insight's
online sample issue.

Please click on the links below to
read articles from
the sample issue (January 15, 2005).
Contents The Table of Contents for the issue
First Page Value Research founder and Mutual Fund Insight editor Dhirendra Kumar’s personal take on key events and issues that affect mutual funds and their investors
Top-rated Funds Funds that are currently rated five- and four-star by Value Research
Fund Radar General and business newspapers often do not give adequate coverage to investment-related news. More importantly, they rarely analyse how such news and events can affect investors. In Fund Radar, we cover a large number of such news items, explaining what impact they will have on fund investors and investments.
Cover Story The topics that Value Research chooses for the magazine’s cover story are a mix of issues that are of current interest and those that are related to timeless and fundamental investment wisdom. Each topic is dealt with in great detail with a complete analysis of all its aspects. The cover stories are prepared with the help of inputs from investors, fund distributors and asset management companies.
The Value 50 This quarterly feature provides a different approach to listing funds compared to the Value Research Scorecard. While the Scorecard gives details of every single fund, the Value 50 lists only 50 funds. However, these 50 funds are a selection of a core set of quality funds which can be used to build almost any portfolio. In the Value 50, we publish not just data about the fund but also a brief comment about why we think it deserves a place in the Value 50. Since the Value 50 has funds from all major equity, debt and hybrid (balanced and monthly income plans) categories, an investor can compile a complete asset-allocation plan out of this list.
Interview Good investment management is often a personality-influenced activity. It’s useful to get the views of a fund manager in order to understand a fund’s performance and prospects better. Every month, we do a detailed Interview with the chief investment officer or a fund manager so that readers can gain an understanding of the strategies of a fund company.
Category Watch Today, fund companies offer schemes in a bewildering array of categories. From mainstream categories like diversified equity funds and medium-term income funds to innovations like dynamic bond funds and asset allocation funds, investment advisors have to stay informed about many different types of funds. In Category Watch, we pick a fund category and analyse it exhaustively. Typically, the article looks at the logic of investing in that category and what kind of investment needs are satisfied by it. It then examines the funds in the category and compares their performance and history.
Fund Focus: FT India Balanced, HDFC Prudence, Kotak Balance, Sundaram Balanced, UTI Balanced Fund Focus is a detailed analysis of one specific scheme. Normally, we cover four to eight major schemes of the category for which we do Category Watch that month. In each fund review, a Value Research analyst examines the scheme’s past performance and sees how it was better or worse than its benchmark or peer group. The analysis also looks at the fund manager’s investment style and extrapolates what kind of future performance is possible.
Family Matters Investors and investment advisors sometimes tend to focus on funds from a particular fund company. When you have a good experience with one fund, you tend to look positively at other funds from the same fund house. Also, when planning systematic transfer plans or switches from one fund to another, it is useful to have a holistic view of all the funds of a fund house. Family Matters does such an analysis of one fund house every month. The entire range of offerings from a fund house are examined in context and analysed in detail.
Portfolio Makeover Our readers often send us their portfolios, asking us to examine their investment choices. Often, the portfolios are meant for a specific task, like retirement planning or aggressive capital growth. Our analysts examine these portfolios and keeping in mind the reader’s requirements, suggest specific changes that should be made to the portfolios. The suggestions are always accompanied by the reasoning that has gone into our analysis and advice.
Buy Sell Hold Value Research continually receives a large number of investment-related queries. Every month, we select those questions whose answers would best solve a problem for a large number of investors. These answers are well-thought out solutions to the kind of problems that investors and investment advisors typically face.
Econology Noted economist Dr. Jay Dubashi has watched Indian businessmen, politicians and their interactions for close to five decades. In his column, he connects the dots between the past and the present of Indian business and politics.
Economic Viewpoint Paranjoy Guha Thakurta has been a journalist and an astute observer of the Indian political scene for two decades. His column in Mutual Fund Insight talks about how current political happenings can impact the economy and investments
Of This & That Sanjeev Pandiya writes from his unique and refreshing viewpoint on stock investing.
Value Research Scorecard: Scorecard Cover Page, Guide to the Scorecard, Equity Funds, Balanced Funds, Bond Funds, Short-term Bond Funds, Cash Funds and Closed-end Funds The Value Research Scorecard is simply the most comprehensive source of data on Indian mutual funds. Published in an easy-to-use format, the scorecard covers every mutual fund in India (currently 529). For each fund, it gives detailed numbers on performance, rank, risk, portfolio, costs and most importantly, the Value Research Fund Rating.

The performance and ranking numbers in the scorecard are comprehensive, incorporating periods ranging from three months to five years (seven days to one month for cash funds). Risk measures incorporate Modern Portfolio Theory concepts like Beta and R2. Portfolio measures include Value Research Fund Style, mean P/E and P/B ratios, mean market capitalisation, top holding and top sector, along with the broad asset allocation between equities, debt and cash.
Fund Insider A graphical analysis of mutual fund trends