Mutual Funds

A Mutual Fund is a mechanism for pooling the savings of a number of investors who share a common financial goal.Anybody with an investible surplus of as little as a fewhundred rupees can invest in Mutual Funds. These investors buy units of a particular Mutual Fund scheme that has a defined investment objective and strategy.

Fidelity Fund Management has entered into an agreement with Federal Bank, one of India's premier private sector banks, for the distribution of its products.

M. Venugopalan, Chairman, Federal Bank, and Ashu Suyash, Managing Director and Country Head, Fidelity Fund Management, announced the distribution tie-up at a press conference today.

Fidelity Fund Management's entire suite of mutual funds will now be available at more than 600 branches of Federal Bank throughout the country.

Edelweiss Capital today announced that it has been granted the required registration by SEBI to start its mutual fund business. In a filing with the Bombay stock exchange, the company revealed that registration was granted to Edelweiss Mutual Fund with Edelweiss Asset Management acting as the investment manager .

EAM plans to lauch nine mutual fund products in 2008 to include equity funds, arbitrage funds, structured products, fixed income funds and innovative equity funds.

Edelweiss Capital shares shot up by 4% on BSE on this announcement.

UTI Dividend Yield Fund, with an NAV of 13.05 declared a dividend of 7% with a record date of May 9, 2008 clocking an annual divident of 24% for the fiscal year 2007-2008. All unit holders registered with the dividend option or investors making fresh investments before May 9th will be eligible for this dividend.

Kotak Mahindra Mutual Fund today announced tax-free dividend of Rs4.00 per unit (on a face value of Rs10/- per unit) in Kotak Balance. The dividend record date is March 25, 2008.

Dividend distribution is subject to the availability and adequacy of distributable surplus. After the distribution of dividend, the NAV will fall to the extent of the dividend and distribution taxes, if any.

Sharekhan, a domestic brokerage reported today that Indian Mutual funds are sitting on 23,545 crores of cash to be deployed in the market. With uncertainty being the key characteristic of stock markets at present, mutual funds are playing it safe and have accumulated a cash pile of over Rs 20,000 crore, which is awaiting deployment after conditions become stable. Rs 19,214 crore lies with existing MFs, while the remaining Rs 4,331 crore has been mobilised through the NFOs.

Unit Trust of India, the country's largest mutual fund group, said today that it would partly lift the freeze on the sale and purchase of units of its flagship fund, US-64, on Aug. 1, permitting almost half of the plan's investors an exit.