More women are managing funds now

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New Delhi: India has witnessed an increase in female representation in the fund managers space, although women still account for a meagre 8% of the total number of fund managers in the country’s asset management industry, a report by Morningstar showed on March 5.

Of the 376 fund managers, 30 are women, who are managing funds either as primary or secondary managers or have oversight as heads of equity or debt. The number of such female fund managers was 28 last year.

Interestingly, the total number of fund managers too saw a healthy increase this year up from 352 managers seen last year. The 30 women fund managers were spread across 19 fund houses, with two fund houses having three or more women fund managers, six fund houses had two women fund managers while 11 fund houses had at least 1 woman fund manager.

When it comes to tenure, 10 fund managers have managed funds consistently for over five years, 12 fund managers have been managing funds between two and five years, and 8 fund managers have a relatively lower experience of managing or co-managing funds below two years.

Women fund managers handled assets worth Rs 4.11 lakh crore, which is 13.5% of the total mutual fund assets.

The mutual fund industry’s assets during the last year have surged to Rs 30.50 lakh crore as on January 2021, up from Rs 27.85 lakh crore a year earlier despite facing a sharp market correction, a full-blown pandemic and strict lockdowns.

“Over the last few years, while the assets managed by women are on the rise, in percentage terms of the overall industry assets, this number has not been something to boast about,” the report noted.

There is certainly a rise in the number of women fund managers in the mutual fund industry. When Morningstar first came out with a report on women fund managers in 2017, there were only 18 women fund managers. This increased to 24 in 2018, 29 in 2019, was 28 in 2020, and again increased to 30 in 2021.

“With a meagre 8% representation, women still remain drastically underrepresented among the ranks of mutual fund managers,” the report added.

Of the total open-ended assets managed by women fund managers, 80% of the assets under management (AUM) outperformed the peer group average on a one-year basis and 80% of the AUM  outperformed on a three-year basis and 74% of the AUM outperformed on a five-year basis, the report noted.

A major chunk of the overall assets managed by women fund managers was in the fixed income category (Rs 1.77 lakh crore or 43%), followed by money market funds, liquid funds and overnight funds (Rs 1.09 lakh crore or 26.6%) and equity funds (Rs 1.03 lakh crore or 25.1%).