MFs barely out of teens, can grow 10-fold in 5 years: Ambani

Mumbai: Urging regulator Sebi to simplify investment and advertisement norms for mutual funds, business leader Anil Ambani today said investing in them should be as easy as buying smartphones on Internet.

He said only one in 25 Indians invests in these products at present, but the investor base can be expanded 10-fold to 60 crore in five years.

"India's mutual fund industry is today poised for its Jan Dhan moment," Ambani said here at an event of the Association of Mutual Funds in India (Amfi).

Reeling out figures, the Reliance Group chief said while 9 out of 10 Indians have a mobile connection and 3 out of 10 have a smartphone, only 1 in 25 Indians has an investment in a mutual fund.

"The comparisons in a global context are even more staggering. There are as many as 58 asset management companies in the world which manage more money than India's entire MF industry put together," said Ambani whose group firm Reliance Capital runs one of the biggest fund houses of the country.

He said India's mutual fund industry is a relatively young industry.

"In fact, I would claim it has barely moved out of its teens!" he added.

Recalling that the erstwhile UTI started India's first mutual fund way back in 1964, Ambani said no private player was there for the next 30 years.

"And it is fitting that the man who is widely regarded as the father of capital markets and the equity cult in India -- my late visionary father, Dhirubhai Ambani -- was among the first to sense the potential that lay ahead.

"We at Reliance, together with my late brother-in-law, Shyam Kothari, shared the exclusive privilege of launching India's first-ever private sector mutual fund in 1993 -- Kothari Pioneer Mutual Fund. Our own offering followed soon afterwards with the launch of Reliance Mutual Fund in 1995," he said.

"From an AUM of under Rs 60 crore in 1995, and Rs 2,200 crore in 2002, we have grown our asset base over 100 times to reach Rs 2.25 lakh crore. As an AMC, we currently manage Rs 3.58 lakh crore. In the same timeframe, India's mutual fund industry, with 5.7 crore individual accounts, has expanded its AUM to reach Rs 20 lakh crore," Ambani said.

The industrialist said Sebi (Securities and Exchange Board of India) has historically played a hugely important and proactive role in the development of the capital markets while safeguarding the interest of the small investor.

"It is to our regulator's immense credit that India is today widely perceived as among the most efficiently run markets in the developing world.

"Going forward, we in the industry need to work closely with you (Sebi) to further simplify the on-boarding process for new investors," Ambani said while suggesting some steps for the the next 100 days.

His suggestions included making MF investment even simpler, allowing anyone with a legitimate bank account to invest in financial products since their bank KYC is already in place and ensuring better utilisation of technology to improve penetration and facilitate faster transactions.

He also urged Sebi to simplify advertising norms to help communicate the value proposition of mutual funds better.

"These steps will bring in a new class of investors to the mutual fund industry," he added.

Ambani urged the industry to give the nation an increase in the number of individual investor folios from 6 crore currently to 60 crore in five years when India will celebrate 75 years of Independence.

He also termed the GST (Goods and Services Tax) as India's 'economic freedom' while noting that it would make "a borderless world of 1.3 billion people -- producers and consumers engaged in a seamless exchange of goods and services, skill sets and capital, labour and ideas".

He said the world has seen nothing like this before as "in less than 48 hours, India will emerge as the biggest free and democratic market in the history of humankind".

"In tandem with its policy precursor -- demonetisation -- GST will forever change the ground rules of doing any kind of trade, commerce or business in India," he added.