Most mid cap, large & mid cap, large cap schemes fail to beat benchmarks in 2023

Most large cap mutual fund schemes failed to beat their benchmarks in the six months in 2023. The large cap category has been struggling to beat its benchmarks since 2018 when the Securities and Exchange Board of India introduced TRI or total return index based benchmarks. Most schemes in the large & mid cap category and mid cap category also failed to beat their respective benchmarks.

However, most other major equity mutual fund categories successfully outperformed their respective benchmarks. Seven equity mutual fund categories – have performed well in the first six months of 2023. (See table)

The mid cap category was the worst hit in the first six months of the year (January – June). Around 69% schemes failed to beat their respective benchmarks. Out of 29 schemes, 20 schemes failed to beat their respective benchmarks. Around 58% of large & mid cap schemes failed to beat their benchmarks. Most large cap schemes (58%) failed to beat their respective benchmarks.

Since it is time for a half yearly review of your mutual funds, ETMutualFunds has been reviewing the performance of major equity mutual fund categories in the last one week. Here we are looking at the performance of these categories with their respective benchmarks.

Small cap category was the top performer during the first half of the year. Around 83% of small cap schemes outperformed their respective benchmarks. Out of 24 schemes, 20 schemes managed to beat their respective benchmarks.

Around 79% of ELSS or tax saving mutual funds beat their respective benchmarks in the six months in 2023. Flexi cap and multi cap category had around 75% of outperformance. Contra and value fund categories had 67% and 63% of outperformance respectively. Focused fund category had around 58% of outperformance.

We considered equity categories such as large cap, mid cap, small cap, large & mid cap, focused fund, flexi cap fund, ELSS funds, value and contra fund. We compared the performance of these schemes with their respective benchmarks during the January to June period.

We calculated returns for the first six months starting from January 1, 2023 to June 30, 2023. We only considered regular and growth schemes for the study.

Note, the above exercise is not a recommendation. This is just an exercise to see how the equity categories fared vis-a-vis their respective benchmarks. We have considered their current benchmarks for the study. For our recommendations, see: Best mutual funds to invest in 2023