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Fund Pick: Birla Advantage Fund

Birla Advantage (BAF) is an aggressive equity fund. The fund carries a 2 per cent entry load. However, investment through regular investment plan or regular transfer of appreciation from its income fund is without any load.

The fund had declared a 20 per cent dividend in August 1999. It has declared another 80 per cent dividend on March 22, 2000. The dividend at the current entry price of Rs 81.93 will result in a tax-free dividend yield of 9.76 per cent after the 2 per cent entry load. However, investors will have to assume the market risk during the stay in the fund.

BAF has consistently been among the top five equity funds across various time periods and has given an annualised return of 54.98 per cent since its launch.

As on January 31, 2000, BAF is invested in infotech (56%), media (12%), telecom (3%), pharma (9%) and FMCG (8%).

In recent months, the fund has reduced its position in pharma and consumer stocks while increasing its exposure in media and telecom sectors. The fund has always been heavily concentrated in its top holdings. The top ten holdings in the portfolio account for almost 55 per cent of net assets. Infosys, Visualsoft and Zee aggregate to over 40 per cent of the portfolio making the fund vulnerable to under-performance in these key holdings.

The fund has a significant allocation to software stocks for a diversified equity fund. However, the fund has consistently maintained big positions in few stocks and has been a winner with this strategy. But the fund size has grown significantly with over Rs 1000 crore assets under management. The fund's winning strategy, which has yielded consistent returns till now, will be put to serious test given the large asset base of over Rs 1,000 crore.

Fund Basics
Objective	Size (Rs cr)	NAV (Rs): 8/3/2000	Exit Price	Entry Price	Total Returns
Growth	1140.5	80.32	80.32	81.93	54.98%
Benchmark Comparisons (%)					29/2/2000
	1M	3M	6M	1Yr	3Yr
Fund	10.4	47.9	128.7	255.5	97.4
Sensex	4.6	17.8	11.2	60.2	14.3
Nat. Index	14.5	46.2	50.2	118.5	27.6
Obj. Avg.	7.5	40.1	53.5	129.9	36.7
Top Holdings (31/1/2000)			Value (Rs cr.)		Net Assets (%)
Infosys			167.85		18.03
VisualSoft			151.68		16.30
Zee Telefilms			110.22		11.84
Subex Infosystem			32.91		3.54
SSI			31.69		3.40
Sonata Software			30.54		3.28
Cipla			27.47		2.95
Satyam Computer			26.57		2.85
Hughes Software			26.23		2.82
Hindustan Lever			19.84		2.13
Usha Beltron			19.78		2.13
Indian Shaving			15.51		1.67
Pfizer			15.08		1.62
Sun Pharma			14.47		1.55
Archies			14.37		1.54
Punjab Tractors			12.76		1.37
Aftek Infosys			12.45		1.34
Fortune Information			11.04		1.19
Britannia			10.71		1.15
Mastek			9.92		1.07

Source: Value Research

Mutual Funds

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