A stock fund, or equity fund, is a fund that invests in stocks, also called equity securities. Stock funds can be contrast with bond funds and money funds. Fund assets are typically mainly in stock, with some amount of cash, which is usually quite small, as opposed to bonds, notes, or other securities. This may be a mutual fund or exchange-traded fund. The objective of an equity fund is long-term growth through capital gains, although in history dividends have also been an important source of total return. Specific equity funds may focus on a certain sector of the market or may be geared toward a certain level of risk.
Stock funds can be illustrious by several properties. Funds may have a specific style, for example, value or growth. Funds may invest in solely the securities from one country, or from many countries. Funds may focus on some size of company, that is, small-cap, large-cap, et cetera. Funds which involve some module of stock picking are said to be actively managed, whereas index funds try as well as possible to mirror specific stock market indices.
Unsure market conditions amid weak macros, trade war worries and liquidity woes beat-up the market through the year.
Among the open-ended equity funds, Axis Bluechip Fund emerged best performer of the year, delivering 5.8 per cent returns. The fund manages around Rs 3,295 crore.
Two UTI funds – Nifty Index Fund and Equity Fund – climbed 3.2 per cent and 3 per cent, respectively. Axis Long-Term Equity Fund and Axis Midcap Fund finished fourth and fifth, with 2.4 per cent returns each.
Small cap funds topped the list of worst performers within this category. The worst performer was the Sundaram Small Cap Fund, which manages assets worth Rs 1,042 crore. Its NAV declined 29.4 per cent for the year.
It was closely followed by HSBC Small Cap Equity Fund (down 25.9 per cent), DSP Small Cap Fund (down 25.2 per cent), Aditya Birla NSE -4.22 % Sun Life Pure Value Fund (down 23.9 per cent) and Aditya Birla Sun Life Small Cap Fund (down 23.6 per cent).
