What is your view on Franklin India Prima Fund as its Standard Deviation & Beta values are poor as compared to peers? Also, its CRISIL rating and Value Research Rating is 2 and 3, respectively.
- Vayshak R
Started in 1993, Franklin India Prima is one of the oldest mid-cap funds. It has a compelling track record and in all the roaring market phases like the one that existed till about six months ago, it did poorly.
All the initial three Franklin funds - be it Bluechip, India Equity (erstwhile Prima Plus) and Prima - focus on quality and they have the longest track record. Further, their focused approach allows them to stick to their investment objective, instead of investing in some dubious pockets of the market, which may look attractive in terms of returns in certain market phases but also disappoint when the market falls. And since these funds of Franklin stay away from such dubious pockets of the market, it leads to a drag on their performance in certain times. Now, this drag on the performance is due to this COVID-led crisis, which has come in a fairly unanticipated way and still lingering.
So, I would say that it remains a high-quality fund. Don't look at it from a narrow perspective of how well it has done in the last one or two years. I'm hopeful but at the same time, I would say that we never had this kind of opportunity that we have today, wherein we have a large number of high-quality mid-cap funds available, which could be a superior alternative.
