Informational Requirements of Mutual Fund Investors: An Empirical Study

The Indian Mutual Fund Industry has enjoyed an explosion in popularity as a result of economic boom, particularly among the first time Mutual Fund Investors. The industry is currently in the consolidation and growth stage of its life cycle. But it faces a number of issues like lack of investor awareness, low penetration levels, lack of systematic evaluation of investors’ requirements, poor service, inefficiency of agents, and increased cost of operations. This paper has made an attempt to study the Pre and Post-Purchase Informational Requirements of the Mutual Fund Investors, their knowledge of Fund Evaluation and their satisfaction towards the reliability of information provided by the Fund Agent. Investors are more concerned with the pre-purchase information pertaining to risks in investing, company profile, dividend information and services offered. They also give importance to post-purchase services like a convenient place to pay subscription, proper mode of payment or receipt, timely distribution of dividend or bonus and a few other kinds of services. They were moderately satisfied on the reliability of information provided by the Fund Agents and a majority of them have little knowledge of Fund Evaluation.