‘Everyone is chasing one thing…’: Radhika Gupta warns against India’s return obsession
At a time when retail investors are glued to one-year return charts and social media buzz, Edelweiss Mutual Fund CEO Radhika Gupta offered a rare moment of introspection. She turned the spotlight not on investor mistakes, but on the collective biases of the financial ecosystem itself.
Speaking at a recent event, Gupta challenged the typical industry narrative. “Whenever someone asks me about investor bias, it hits a nerve,” she said. “We sit on stage and criticize investors, but those same biases exist in all of us.”
Her sharpest critique was reserved for what she called the obsession with one-year returns, a trend she believes is driven by WhatsApp groups, performance dashboards, and media headlines. “Nobody is talking about equity or debt anymore,” Gupta said. “Everyone is chasing one thing, gold and silver.”
She pointed to her own fund house’s experience with a product that was dismissed at launch. “Three years ago, we introduced a 50-50 Gold and Silver fund. Honestly, it was a silly product,” she admitted. “Returns looked so bad, my team didn’t even want to include them in the presentation.”
Launched quietly on her birthday in 2022, the fund drew just ₹12 crore. Today, it receives ₹25 crore daily. “We didn’t market it. You’re not asking for it. Your bias is,” she said. “Why? Because it delivered 67.5 percent in the past year.”
Gupta made a critical distinction that she feels the market overlooks. “It is not offering 67 percent. It has offered that return. There is a difference.”
Despite surging interest, she is now focused on launching fixed income SIPs, products that currently receive little attention. “I have received 15 emails in the last four days asking me to launch Platinum and Copper SIPs,” she said. “But three years ago, no one cared about these metals. Back then, silver was considered industrial waste. Gold barely had any takers.”
The smartest move, she said, is not chasing what is hot. It is spotting what everyone else is ignoring.
