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There is no concept on interest in mutual funds.You buy units at a certain price, and hold ownership of the units, as if you own property. The changes in value is reflected in price per unit, which would obviously then show gains/losses in total value.
The only thing reflected in the monthly statements is a purchase or sale of units.

The PPF contributions allowed by govt were steadily increased from Rs 50K p.a. when I started investing to Rs 70K then Rs 100K and now it is Rs 150K p.a.
Hence the amount stands at approx 28L. This also includes an interest earned of roughly Rs 1L p.a. for the last few years.
PPF is a safe investment but upon doing a theoretical exercise with HDFC Tax saver, I found that I would have been better compensated in HDFC Tax saver vis-a-vis my PPF contributions.

Hence the query whether it makes sense to invest in PPF nowadays.

PPF is to be considered as one of the investment options not the investment option. Although the returns are quite low in comparison to the other options available but this is supposed to be the safest one with an advantage of returns being totally tax free as of now. This option needs to be utilized only for long term objectives like retirement corpus.

PPF always needs to be considered in addition to the other goal related investment.

I had invested in 6 different ones with dividend payout option. DSP, ABSL, Frankline, UTI, HDFC & Reliance. The latter 4 gave dividends. The first 2 didn't. But when I calculate on the whole the first 2 gave 70% returns after 3 years. Whereas the dividend paying 4 gave 40% returns.

Since there is a cost involved in giving us the dividends, the returns are always less.

Hope this helps.

I have been investing always in old fund houses. ABSL, DSP, Frankline, HDFC, Reliance, UTI.

Investing directly with the fund houses is always better - less cost. That also means so many user IDs and that many passwords. If you bank with HDFC Bank then you can open the investment account with them and invest through them.

With options like Funds India, there is no charges to the investor according to their revenue model (or is it not true?). This is what Funds India claims. Or are they taking the investor for a ride? Anything I should check with them?

Well I wouldn't trust all my investment and bank account details with a broker company that is just 8 years old. There are always possibilities of privacy and hacking issues. It would be better to invest with the fund houses themselves.

DSP & Black Rock are separating after 10 years. They have given good returns in the past even when DSP was with Merrill Lynch. Now what?

Are they going to be alone or partner with someone? The some of the senior people who worked for 10 years have already left the company!

There is no word about a non-compete agreement between DSP & Black Rock. If there is none then Black Rock may start India operations on their own. That will be good.

DSP on their own looks a wee bit scary.

@Kulin_Shah; I understand that BR are operating in India on their own name, but are no longer in the MF business (you need a Desi partner). The are totally into asset management. I guess the parting was congenial.

One of the news articles mentioned that Blackrock are in line to buy IDFC MF. Reliance is another contender.

I think DSP is a trust-worthy group on its own. I am continuing my investments.

Funds India only deals in regular plans. They get paid by the mutual fund company - these commissions are factored in the mutual funds unit you purchase via them.

It's always better to buy direct funds (from the mutual fund companies through their website) primarily because then you don't have to pay those commissions.

Typically, the expense ratio for a regular fund is 2% and for a direct fund its 1%. Over a long period this 1% difference can make hell lot of difference.

For example, if you do a SIP of Rs 5000 in a regular mutual fund and in a direct mutual fund, direct fund value will be more than 40 lakhs after 25 years (assuming your fund grows at around 12-13% CAGR) when compared to regular mutual fund value.

If you don't like the mutual fund websites, you can try platforms like zerodha or kuvera or MFutility etc. Just google and you will get to know a lot about them.

Remember that dividends are subject to a tax of 28% which is paid by the fund house. So, compared to the growth option dividend option has 2 disadvantages:
1. Tax is cut at 28% (although you never see it as this deduction is done by the fund house).
(Remember even growth funds are taxible on redemption - so this does not mean growth funds save you 28% but depending on your situation growth funds usually incur lesser tax).

2. Possibility of dividends getting spent, specially if amounts are small.

Rather than dividend funds, I would suggest a systematic withdrawal plan if required.

Thanks woof! I'm a noob and please bear with my questions. I just tried using the SIP calculator on value research portal and there is a clean 15000 difference a direct fund makes over a regular one for a 1K SIP over 5 years.

Correct me if I'm wrong, doesn't Zerodha, Kuvera do the same job as Funds India? Or do they allow us to buy direct funds through their portal?

Yes, they both do buy from Mutual Fund provider but the fees model is different.

Zerodha have a subscription fees of ₹50 per month. So, for 5 year you will pay 50 x 12 x 5 = 3,000 as fees.


Regular mutual funds like FundsIndia do not have subscription fee, but they take commission, when you buy/sell or hold (monthly/yearly). Also, these charges will increase as your investment amount increases.

How about consortium like mfuonline or camsonline? Do they have any hidden charges or commission from investors?