What's hot, what's not with mutual funds?

Mutual funds (MFs) bought huge quantity of shares of AV Birla Group company - Hindalco Industries, Gammon group company - Gammon Infrastructure and AV Birla Group company - Idea Cellular, while reduced exposure to automobile manufacturer Ashok Leyland, tyre manufacturer Apollo Tyres and finance provider to infrastructure company - IDFC. Metal, power, FMCG, airline and packaging sectors dominated the top 50-buy list.

However, selling was seen in shares of telecom, oil & gas, technology, banking & finance, auto, realty and sugar companies. Stocks were re-aligned in the construction, engineering, pharma, media and textile sectors. In terms of value, Tata Steel, Hindalco Industries and SAIL were the top purchases by MFs, while Tata Motors, TCS and Jindal Steel & Power topped the selling list.

A study of the top ten mutual funds' equity portfolios as on December 31, which are Reliance, HDFC, Prudential ICICI, DSP BR, SBI, Tata, Templeton, UTI, Kotak and Birla Sun Life revealed that seven out of ten funds bought shares of Hindalco Industries. Among these funds, Templeton and Birla MFs have bought biggest quantity of shares, which was over 56 lakh shares each. This stock was the top buy in terms of value as well as volume.

Top shares traded by MFs  (based on volume)
Top 5 shares bought	No. of Shares
Hindalco	17,862,826
Gammon Infra	13,401,940
Idea Cellular	10,687,933
NHPC	9,900,145
Tata Steel	8,076,522
Top 5 shares sold	No. of Shares
Ashok Leyland	-10,448,491
Apollo Tyres	-9,408,717
IDFC	-5,942,950
Yes Bank	-4,816,599
GVK Power	-3,815,565

Tata Steel was the top bought stock in terms of value, wherein six out of nine funds were buyers. Reliance MF was the top buyer in the stock with over 46 lakh shares being bought. In terms of value, Steel Authority of India emerged as the third top bought stock; eight out of ten MFs were buyers in the stock and Tata MF was the top buyer in the stock with over 23 lakh shares being bought.

However, third top sold stock in terms of value was the Jindal Steel & Power; seven of ten MFs made buying into the stock and Reliance MF was the top seller with over 22 lakh shares being sold. In the metals and mining space, fund houses bought JSL, Gujarat NRE Coke and Indian Metals & Ferro while sold Sesa Goa and Welspun Gujarat.

Gammon Infrastructure was the second top bought stock in terms of volume and SBI MF was the only buyer in the stock, which bought over 1.34 crore shares. Among the construction stocks, GMR Infrastructure, Gammon India and Hindustan Construction Company figured in the buying list of top 50 stocks while IVRCL Infrastructure and, Nagarjuna Construction were sold.