THREE STOCKS MFs WENT BANANAS OVER

When you invest in mutual funds, you are indirectly investing in stocks. So, we decided to find out which are the stocks most mutual funds in the equitylinked savings scheme, flexi-cap, multi-cap and large-and-mid-cap categories invest in. We analysed 149 funds that have a broad mandate to invest in a wide array of stocks and came up with the three stocks that most mutual funds invest in

- Shoaib Zaman

As part of the special issue on mutual funds, we tried to understand which stock is bought the most by asset management companies (AMCs). Given that thematic or sectoral schemes focus on their themes and sectors, we eliminated the sub-category. Similarly, we eliminated schemes dedicated to one market-cap category only (such as large-cap, mid-cap and others), assuming there would be too much bias.

We chose equity-linked savings schemes (ELSS), flexi-cap, multi-cap, large-and-mid-cap, and value/contra categories. This led us to a shortlist of 149 funds that have a broad mandate, whereby a fund manager had invested in a wide array of stocks from April 1-30, 2024. Within this, we looked at the stocks that were bought the most from three aspects.

One, the stock that was most bought by value (Axis Bank).

Two, the stock which sold the maximum number of shares with a value of over ₹100 crore across AMCS (Vedanta). At times, the price of the stock changes due to market impact, and the change in value alone doesn't necessarily reveal interest. If a share is valued at a low price, it is traded more and showcases higher volume, but the value of the purchase may not be significant. So, we considered volume along with the value of the purchase.

Three, to make sure that a small fund house buying many stocks can also result in a lopsided view, we redid the exercise only on funds from the same set of categories, whose assets under management (AUM) was more than ₹5,000 crore (Angel One).

Here's our take on the three stocks thus chosen.

AXIS BANK