Will 0.5% become the industry standard for transaction costs?

Expense Account, Mint

Are loads back? The distribution industry was agog when news filtered out last week that the Bajpai committee set up by the Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) had recommended a 50 basis points (bps) charge on the National Pension System (NPS) point of sale. A quick backgrounder: The Bajpai committee was set up to find out why the low-cost NPS is not popular with the retirement corpus-targeting Indian. Less than 50,000 people have handed over about Rs 100 crore of funds to NPS in the two years it has been thrown open to the Indian public. In contrast, equity funds have gathered a net of Rs 470 crore of retail money in the past 12 months despite the absence of a load on the product.

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Rs100 is 10% or 0.1% or 0.0001%

Expense Account, Mint

Sometimes a committee leaks a proposal it is considering to test reaction in stories and comments. Or sometimes it is a dissenter to what is being discussed who will leak a proposal or a decision to get public opinion against what is being proposed. Either of the two must have happened last week when we read that a Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) committee examining a new compensation structure for mutual fund distributors is close to recommending a Rs 100 transaction fee on the sale of a mutual fund product. The quick push back from both distributors and consumer activists shows that both are unhappy. The distributors say that a flat fee of Rs 100 does not even cover the cost of transport and is neither here nor there. The consumer voices say that a flat fee is inherently unfair, translating to a 10% cost for a Rs 1,000 investor and a 0.1% cost for a Rs 1 lakh investor. They fear that this fee is an attempt to get entry loads in through the back door. It may begin as Rs 100 today, but what will prevent it from becoming Rs 1,000 tomorrow? Or coming back to a percentage in another year’s time?

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Mutual fund industry makeover: season 2

Expense Account, Mint

For equally good food, which cafe would you pick—one that has good parking and is on the ground floor or another that has difficult parking and is two flights up a dark stairway? I find myself choosing the first over the other most times. I also find my selection process sensitive to costs of access such as parking fees. I tend to avoid places that will charge more than the usual Rs10 as parking.

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Five concepts you need to understand while investing

Expense Account, Mint

No, this is not about what this column expects the new government to do for financial sector reform. It is assuming that these are going to be fast-tracked, and along with new products and services, consumers of financial products will bear the burden of too much choice. In his book The Paradox Of Choice, sociology professor Barry Schwartz links excessive choice to consumer misery. He shows how too many similar-looking options actually cause consumers to freeze and prefer status quo to taking any proactive decision. While in the US the number of mutual fund schemes outnumber listed stocks, India is getting there with at least 1,500 funds and investment-linked insurance plans. This number is set to balloon in the next five years as more firms line up at the Indian doorway to get a piece of the vast Indian financial products market.

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Is the new pension system really that cheap?

Expense Account, Mint

One of the reasons the new pension system (NPS) had got good previews before launch was due to the tiny costs the scheme carried. However, newspaper edits this week suggest that there is fine print to be looked at and that the product is not as cheap as touted.

The criticism also is that the product is elitist and does not work for a poor person who will invest the minimum Rs6,000 a year but will pay the same upfront cost as a person investing Rs1 lakh. Is there truth in this cost argument?

Any discussion on cost cannot be restricted to only one facet of the cost. A financial product carries at least three kinds of costs: You have to pay to get on the bus, that’s the entry load. You have to pay to ride the bus, that’s the annual recurring fund management and other annual administrative costs. And last, you pay to get off the bus, that’s the exit load.

 

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