Portfolio Management Services (PMS) funds had a stellar run in the year 2023, giving as much as 86 percent returns. Most of this good performance was fuelled by the rally in smallcap stocks, where PMS funds had a major shareholding. Aequitas, Shepherd's Hill, Investsavvy, Samvitti Capital, and Invasset were the top five PMS in 2023, according to data by PMS Bazar.
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Aequitas Investment Consultancy was the best performing PMS of 2023. Its India Opportunities Product fund gave the highest returns at 86.88 percent in the year. The approach has an AUM of Rs 3,020 crore and invests only in smallcap companies. It has recently suspended inflows in the fund as the recent rally in smallcaps have left little room for the PMS to find reasonably valued investments. Avanti Feeds, Finolex Cables, and HEG were Aequitas’ top multibagger stocks since its inception in in 2013. Since inception, the PMS has given an annualised return of 34 percent, while its benchmark has given returns of 13 percent. An investment of Rs 1 crore in the fund in February 2013 would be Rs 23.1 crore in November 2023. The fund is managed by Siddhartha Bhaiya, who started out as a research analyst and then started Aequitas in 2013.
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Shepherd’s Hill was the second best performing PMS in 2023. Its Value Magno approach returned investors 80.53 percent in 2023. Value Magno is a flexicap approach with an AUM of Rs 102 crore. Since inception, the PMS has outperformed its benchmark with 18.83 percent returns while the benchmark has given returns of 11.79 percent in the same period. The PMS has a low churn rate of 10-20 percent as compared to others. Churn rate across the PMS industry is around 50 percent. The PMS did not remove any company from its portfolio during the COVID 19 market crash because it has no hotels or airlines in its portfolio.
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Investsavvy’s Alpha Fund has given returns of 73.78 percent in 2023. Unlike the above two, Investsavvy is a fairly new PMS which started a year and a half back. The PMS is sector agnostic and has a concentrated portfolio with a maximum of 20 companies in it. Banking, tyres, tech, and medical are the sectors that have worked well for the fund this year. Tyres are up 3x, while tech and banking are up 2.5x this year. The fund is managed by Ashish Goel who has over 25 years of experience in financial markets. He holds an MS in Computational Finance from Carnegie Mellon University and has worked with Standard Chartered, ICICI Bank, Bear Stearns, and others. He has an MBA from IIM Calcutta and a B. Tech degree from IIT Kanpur.
Samvitti Capital has given returns of 71.99 percent in 2023. The PMS has major sector holdings in industrial manufacturing, IT, construction, and financial services. The fund is managed by Prabhakar Kudva, who featured in 40 under 40 investment managers by Association of International Wealth Management of India. Since inception, the PMS has given 40.47 percent returns while the benchmark has given 16.23 percent returns. It has an AUM of Rs 1,250 crore and over 300 clients.
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Invasset has given returns of 70.49 percent returns this year. Its fund, Growth Pro Max Fund, has almost 73 percent in smallcaps. The PMS has more exposure towards defence, engineering railways and financial lending. The PMS has outperformed the benchmark with returns of 38 percent since inception, while the benchmark has given returns of 18.33 percent. Invasset uses its inbuilt algorithm to narrow down its stock selections after which it is done manually.
