Equity MF Folio Surges by 27 Lakh in April-November

New Delhi: Equity mutual funds (MFs) witnessed addition of nearly 2.7 million investor accounts or folios in the first eight months of the current financial year, primarily on account of strong retail participation.
     
This follows an addition of 2.5 million folios for the entire financial year 2014-15.

Folios are numbers designated for individual investor accounts, though one investor can have multiple accounts.
     
The number of equity folios jumped to 34,367,673 last month from 31,691,619 at March-end, an increase of around 2.6 million, according to Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) data on investor accounts with 44 fund houses.
     
April last year saw the first rise in more than four years.
     
Prior to FY15, equity MF sector had seen a continuous closure of folios since March 2009, following the global financial crisis in late 2008. From March 2009, as many as 15 million folios had been closed.

The investor base reached its peak of 41 million in March 2009, while it stood at 37.7 million in March 2008.

Before 2014-15, there was a complete lull in equity inflows as well as generation of new folios, but in the past one year, equity markets have come back to life and yielded solid returns.

Industry experts said heightened investor interest has led to a sharp increase in retail folios.

It is the optimism of investors because of which the folios in equity segment have increased.

Besides, increased participation by retail investors in equities has led to an increase in folio numbers, experts said.