ETF

Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) are financial products which provide direct investment exposure to benchmark indices and commodities. As per the SEBI Guidelines, an ETF must deploy at least 95% of its assets in securities of the underlying index.  ETFs undertake passive investing, and the fund managers replicate the underlying index and implement changes in the investment portfolio as and when the changes happen in the index constitution.

Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) are passive investment options that offer direct investment exposure to underlying indices or commodities like silver, gold etc. As per SEBI Guidelines, an ETF must deploy at least 95% of its assets in securities of the underlying index.

Fund managers are mandated to track the specified index and implement changes in the investment portfolio as and when the changes happen in the index constitution. They cannot go beyond the index composition or their respective weights.

Advantages of Exchange Traded Funds

Mutual funds have been steadily emerging as an attractive investment option for retail investors and have become one of the intelligent avenues to invest money. This is because it's convenient to invest in mutual funds, and there are many schemes to choose from.

Across different mutual fund schemes, the investment portfolio may be managed actively or passively. While active investing requires making active investment decisions by the fund managers, passive investing tracks benchmark indices instead of fund managers making independent investment decisions.

One may consider active and passive investment products when one plans to invest in financial markets. Active investment products are those where the investment portfolio is being managed actively, with the professional fund management team taking investment decisions after research and due diligence. The objective of an actively managed scheme is to generate alpha, i.e. returns over and above market benchmarks.

Debt funds are mutual funds that invest in money market and debt securities to generate returns for the investors. These funds may invest in the securities/ bonds issued by sovereign entities, banks, corporates, Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs), etc. depending upon the specific categories of debt funds' investment objective. Debt funds can be broadly classified into duration funds, money market funds, gilt funds, and credit opportunities funds. 

What is gold ETF?

A gold Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) is an investment option that tracks domestic gold prices. A single gold ETF fund unit will be equal to 1 gram of gold.

A diversified investment portfolio holds the key to long term financial prosperity. The investors must plan to allocate their investments across different asset classes such as equity, debt, gold, etc. Since the investors don't rely on a single asset class for their portfolio performance, the returns may be expected to be stable across market cycles. While equity renders the potential of higher returns over the long term, the debt investments may impart with stability to the portfolio. 

What is an ETF?

ETF stands for Exchange Traded Fund. As the name suggests, ETFs can be traded on stock exchanges, just like other stocks listed on stock exchanges.

As per the SEBI Guidelines, ETFs must invest at least 95% of their net assets in the underlying index's securities. Thus, ETFs adopt passive investment strategies tracking different indices, viz., equity, debt, or commodities.

When it comes to investing in equity markets, investors tend to prefer investing through mutual funds. Investors can invest in a wide range of mutual fund schemes, suiting their investment horizon, and risk appetite. One such investment option is the Exchange Traded Funds which is populary know as ETFs. Equity ETFs tracks an underlying equity index and the main difference between traditional mutual fund schemes and ETF is, ETFs can be traded on the stock exchange. 

Not all asset classes have been winners consistently in the investing world since different asset classes may react differently to macroeconomic events. As such, asset classes like equities, debt, gold, real estate etc., tend to perform in their respective economic cycles.

While equities may perform better during periods of high economic growth, debt may perform better during periods of decreasing interest rate scenario. Similarly, gold may be a better performer when asset classes like equity and debt seem volatile and uncertain, as gold is considered a safer investment option.