Mutual Funds in 2018: Here Are the Top Performers

The investor count is estimated to have grown by over 1.3 crore in 2018.

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Mutual funds added a whopping Rs 3 lakh crore to their asset base in 2018 and the uptrend may continue in the new year, helped by a consistent rise in the Systematic Investment Plan (SIP) flows and a strong participation of retail investors despite volatile markets.

The Asset Under Management (AUM) of the industry rose by 13 percent to Rs 24 lakh crore in 2018 by November-end, up from Rs 21.26 lakh crore at the end of December 2017, data available with the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI) showed.

The investor count is also estimated to have grown by over 1.3 crore during the year.

The pace of growth, however, declined for the asset size in 2018 as compared to last year. The industry had seen a surge of 32 percent in the AUM or an addition of over Rs 5.4 lakh crore in 2017.

Going into 2019, the fund houses expect the industry would witness robust growth as the sector is yet to tap its full potential. Besides, several measures taken by the regulator Sebi will help in increasing the penetration of mutual funds.

As 2018 marks the sixth consecutive annual rise in the industry AUM after a drop for two preceding years, here are the top-performing Mutual Funds of the year, according to the analysis of Bloomberg data, done by BloombergQuint.

Large-Cap Funds

Axis Blue Chip Fund was the top performer, with a year-to-date return of 7.2 percent.

The fund, which invests in equity and equity-related instruments of mid-sized companies, gave annualised returns of 13.3 percent and 21.7 percent for the three-year and five-year periods, data showed.

Smallcap Fund

HDFC Small and Midcap Fund was the top performer, with a year-to-date return of 7 percent.

According to the data, even though its NAV fell 7 percent, the HDFC Small and Midcap Fund gave annualised returns of 17 percent for the three-year while the Nifty Smallcap Index returned 4 percent during the period.

Multicap Fund

Axis Multicap Fund was the top performer with a year-to-date return of 8 percent.

According to an analysis done by BloombergQuint, the fund gave a return of 8 percent this year compared to 2.2 percent return by UTI Equity Fund.

(With inputs from PTI and BloombergQuint)