Fund Manager's outlook on key economic indicators

Atul Kumar, Fund Manager - Equity, is optimistic on Indian equities in the long run. He said "Even after a brief rally in year so far, we see equity valuations as being reasonable. Irrespective of the global economic problems, we see India well poised to achieve a GDP growth of 6.5-7% over next many years. Investors can consider allocating higher to equities at this point of time for good returns in the long term"

Chirag Mehta, Fund Manager - Gold said "It is a challenging time for the yellow metal as the dollar strengthens since the focus remains on Eurozone worries. Gold has been reacting positively at times when crisis aggravates or unorthodox monetary measures like quantitative easing are undertaken by policy makers. Global gold exchange traded product holdings have largely remained steady, despite the corrective phase, signaling that long term investors are still worried about the macro economic scenario and the issues surrounding currency debasement, and still prefer gold as an effective portfolio diversification tool. Such signs of strength in gold are indeed encouraging for gold investors."

Arvind Chari, Fund Manager - Debt said "Liquidity conditions have improved considerably and we expect it to remain in a comfortable deficit till September. This has led to short term yields falling quite sharply with 3 months yields trading at around 9.0% levels from around 9.5% in June. Even 1 year bank CD yields have dropped to below 9.5%. Longer tenure yields have also remained stable despite the disappointment on the rate cut by the RBI in its June policy review."