57% investment professionals bet on equities for best returns

Mumbai: More than half of the country's investment professionals think that equities will provide the best returns to investors compared with other asset classes and have predicted an 11 percent surge in the benchmark BSE Sensex by the end of 2016-17, says a report.

According to survey findings by the Indian Association of Investment Professionals (IAIP), nearly 57.26 percent of the investment professional expect "generous gains in equity market indices, with BSE Sensex predicted to climb 11 per cent from the current 25,000 level".

"...Investment professionals in India expect equities to provide the best total risk adjusted returns for the year ending March 31, 2017 (compared to other asset classes such as bonds, cash, commodities, precious metals and real estate)," the survey said.

However, the survey said the investment professionals were concerned about India's economic growth outlook over the next 12 months on account of slowdown in the global economy and deflation risk, among others.

About 40 percent respondents surveyed estimate that the country's real GDP growth rate would be between 7-7.5 percent by the end of the current fiscal.

IAIP President Jayesh Gandhi said investment professionals "expect government policy initiatives and action to translate into better corporate profitability and earnings growth which would drive equity market returns".

Reliance Mutual Fund CIO (equity investments) Sunil Singhania said, "India will grow to a USD 4 trillion economy in the next 7-8 years."

Noting that the last fiscal was challenging due to a weak monsoon, Singhania added that "with political stability, we expect earnings to grow".

"We are doing things correctly on the strategic and structural front, especially in infrastructure," he added.

IAIP, a member society of CFA Institute in India, is an association of local investment professionals consisting of portfolio managers, security analysts, investment advisors and other financial professionals.

CFA Institute is the global association of investment professionals.

The survey, unveiled here today, was conducted among 635 investment professionals across India.