Frequent Portfolio Juggling Hurts Investors Slide

Can an Investor Simply Pick the Top Held Stocks from a Mutual Fund Portfolio?

A portfolio is not merely a list of names of companies. If it were so, then fund managers will not be such a well paid lot.

There are three vital ingredients that need careful consideration before inclusion to a portfolio:

1. Justification behind inclusion of the names of the candidates themselves.
2. The fair price that can be paid to purchase the particular share.
3. Regular monitoring the performance and need to take necessary action.

Let us examine the three elements in detail.

The constituents of the portfolio:

I do not agree with the view that the top held companies of a mutual fund are naturally good names that merit inclusion in a portfolio. Generally fund managers included the market leaders in the industry segment (based on too general criteria like turnover, market share and market capitalisation) in the portfolio irrespective of the real balance sheet strength. Let me give you an example. Please see the three picture below:

We can see that even though NTPC ranks number one in turnover and market capitalisation it is a laggard in EBT%, Current Ratio, Quick Ratio and Dividend Yield Similarly, Reliance Infrastructure’s EBT% is too low and unacceptable. Hence both these companies do not merit inclusion in a good portfolio, but I have no doubt that both will appear in the portfolios of many mutual funds. On the other hand SJVN Ltd., though small and ranking lowest in terms of turnover and market capitalisation is a brilliant performer in all parameters and rightfully occupies a pride of place in our ‘Portfolio 2K15’.

Price at which an Investment can be made:

Secondly we cannot simply include the top held shares of mutual fund in our portfolio because we do not know at what price the mutual fund had made the investment and what is the prevailing price today. In the year 2009, Infosys Ltd. share price was in the range of Rs.280, today its price is Rs.1031.85. Perhaps the mutual bund had acquired a major chunk of its holding in 2009 and it does not make sense to buy the scrip today at Rs.103.85, without deeper analysis, does it?

A value investor writes next to the name of the selected candidates the price beyond which the share shall not be purchased. For example, even though SJVN Ltd., is a great company, worth including in our portfolio, it cannot be bought at a price over Rs.34 a piece (10 times the EPS of 3.4).

Regular monitoring the performance:

Generally if a good company is included in the portfolio, you should be able to simply forget about it for ten years. Having said this, companies can make grave mistakes and jeopardize the interests of investors. Therefore one needs to continuously monitor and ensure the shares are worth holding even after making the investment. When this is the case for shares selected by us after careful evaluation, how can we merely include companies selected by a third party, howsoever reputed a mutual fund that institution could be?

In summary, it is not advisable to include in our portfolio top held shares from the portfolio of a mutual fund. Every inclusion purchase shall be made based on a fresh evaluation taking guidance from points highlighted above.

How Frequent Changes to Mutual Fund Portfolio Affect Investor Interest?

Full and Actual Question from Mr.Sameer Mittal:

Does acportfolio of stocks in the mutual fund change frequently?

 

Answer:

Dear Mr.Sameer Mittal

A very fundamental and useful question as it touches the very foundations of investment philosophy. I will give you ten out of ten for asking this question. The real issue is not whether the portfolio is churned frequently, for the answer is yes, indeed the stocks in the portfolio change frequently; more important is to raise and ponder over the question, what is the necessity to meddle with the portfolio?

Legendary value investor Warren Buffett says, “If a share is not worth holding for 10 years, it is not worth holding even for 10 minutes!”, which means that only stocks that are worth holding for a lifetime should have found their place in the portfolio, in the first place! A frequent change in the composition of the portfolio is bad and detrimental to the interest of the investors in the mutual fund.

Next let us address the point, why does the fund manager meddle with the portfolio? The reasons are as follows:

1. Investors have a short-term investment horizon. They tend to measure returns based on the ‘Net Asset Value’ or ‘NAV’ of the units, which in-turn is entirely dependent on fluctuation in the prices of the underlying shares in the portfolio. The short term vision and unreasonable expectation of growth in the NAV exert extreme pressure on the fund managers.
2. The mutual funds instead of attempting to educating the investors, succumb to the performance pressure and resort to unwanted churning of the portfolio.
3. The fund managers also think they need to do something to justify their employment and the high salaries they are paid; how can one justify the employment and monthly pay-check if one has created a portfolio that need not be touched for a hundred years?

 

Mutual Fund Manager Juggling the Portfolio

Having understood that stocks in a mutual fund portfolio change frequently and the reasons for the stirring let us now study why it is not in the interest of investors:

1. The annual fund management fee which is about 2.25% is very high and pinches the pocket of the investor. On the other hand fund management costs of index fund or anexchange traded fund are less than 0.50%, precisely because there are no frequent changes to the portfolio.
2. The market dynamics are so violent and unpredictable, sometimes if you sell shares of a good company, the prices may undergo such an upward shift that you may not be able to buy the shares again - at least for a very long time; you simply miss the bus.
3. Frequent moving in and out of a company deprives the portfolio certain jackpot benefits like bonus shares, and extraordinary special dividends (for example Hindustan Zinc Ltd. declared 1200% special dividend on the occasion of Golden Jubilee celebrations) in addition to the regular annual dividends.

In conclusion the underlying shares of a mutual fund portfolio under go undesirable frequent changes which cost investors dearly.

With Best Regards

Anand

Please Note: This post is based on the question I had answered on the website ‘Quora’, which I thought could be useful to the visitors to this blog site also.