US-based Franklin Templeton on Friday issued an apology to capital market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) for any misunderstanding over the closure of six of its schemes in the...

An Indian-origin man has been sentenced to 52 weeks' imprisonment after pleading guilty to writing offensive graffiti at a number of locations across Leicester in central England, some of which was...

The regulator had also observed that mutual funds should not depend totally on credit rating agencies but should do their own assessments.

Debt schemes of mutual funds for long have been seen as low risk, but shuttering six schemes and leaving investors in a lurch will impact investor sentiment.

Franklin Templeton MF also said that their commitment to India remains steadfast as they have been early as patient investors in India.

The above mentioned Trust is the authorised body to manage and supervise the day-to-day activities and facilities of the samadhi temple.

There will be no darshans in all the government-controlled temples in Himachal Pradesh in view of the possibility of people getting infected with the coronavirus in gatherings, the state government said in a statement.

As part of the precautionary measures, the district administration has advised tourists to vacate hotels IN two days and refrain from visiting Puri for now.

Major temples and places of worship across the country have announced various restrictions to curb the rush of pilgrims.

Major temples in Mathura have been closed for three to 10 days in view of the coronavirus pandemic, temple authorities said.

The construction was initiated amid restrictions in the wake of the coronavirus threat in Ayodhya.

The decision to reschedule the opening of the temple gates was taken in view of circumstances created by the COVID-19 pandemic, Dharmadhikari of the Badrinath temple Bhuvan Chandra Uniyal said.

''The opening ceremony of the four temples in Uttarakhand is an important annual event attended by thousands of pilgrims but the extended lockdown to halt the spread of coronavirus has cast its shadow on the yatra this year. The Chardham yatra begins with the opening of Gangotri and Yamunotri temples on April 26 this year.''

The annual "Chandan Yatra" and "Akshaya Tritiya" festivals of Lord Jagannath will be held inside the temple premises in Puri on Sunday.

The doors of the eleventh jyotirlinga at Kedarnath in the Garhwal Himalayas were opened at 6.10 am.

From wounding up six debt mutual fund schemes with an AUM of over Rs 30,000 crore, to dealing with the ire of investors, the fund house has been busy fire-fighting ever since the nationwide lockdown was announced.

Andrew Wong knew from an early age that running a restaurant required improvisation, having watched his parents steer their London Chinese restaurant through nearly 30 years of good times and bad.

The Department of Justice announced today that it will require International Paper Company and Temple-Inland Inc. to divest three containerboard mills in order to proceed with their $4.3 billion merger.

It was just confirmed that I'll be teaching in Temple University's RA/QA MS program this spring. Specifically, I'll be teaching the ad-promo course.

If you or anyone you know is interested, please reach out to me for information. The course will be taught out of the Fort Washington campus, but online enrollment is permitted.

Here's the complete schedule of classes for the spring.

Marking the occasion of Mahashivratri along with the success of her film Luka Chuppi, Kriti Sanon visited a Shiv temple in the suburbs of Mumbai to express her gratitude to the almighty.

With an opening of Rs 8.01 crore, Luka Chuppi marked Kriti Sanon's highest opener, as the lead actress. Amidst her busy schedule, Kriti visited Shiv Mandir in Santacruz to offer prayers and thank the almighty for showering her with love from the audience.

Check out some pictures here:

Kriti Sanon clicked at Shiv Temple in Santacruz (All Pictures/Yogen Shah)

Kriti Sanon clicked at Shiv Temple in Santacruz with her mother

Kriti Sanon clicked at Shiv Temple in Santacruz with her mother

Riding high on the success of her recent film Luka Chuppi, Kriti Sanon has been garnering love and appreciation for her quirky character Rashmi.

Kriti Sanon obliges a fan with a selfie outside the temple

Earlier, the actress visited Cinema halls to gauge the reactions of the audience as well as sold tickets at the theatre herself, surprising her fans with her sweet gesture. The actress has carved a place for herself with strong characters delivering remarkable performances there by winning the hearts of the audience.

Beginning the year with Luka Chuppi, Kriti Sanon is all set to offer a plethora of diverse characters this year with her films hailing from different genres. She will be next seen in Arjun Patiala, Housefull 4, and Panipat.

Also Read: Exclusive: Kriti Sanon on Panipat character: Killing people with sword was powerful

Catch up on all the latest entertainment news and gossip here. Also download the new mid-day Android and iOS apps to get latest updates

COVID-19 has started showing its impact on the mutual fund industry. Few days ago I mentioned in my article, Debt mutual funds witnessed massive outflows of Rs 1.95 trillion in the month of March.

Though we could attribute most of that outflow to corporates redeeming funds to meet their quarter end obligations, high volatility and uncertainty as consequences of the pandemic could have also played a major hand in the redemption pressure for debt schemes.

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FII have been redeeming investments heavily in equity and debt segment ever since WHO declared COVID-19 a pandemic. In March, FIIs pulled out Rs 60,375 crore from the debt market.

High redemption and lack of buying interest has made debt mutual fund schemes vulnerable, especially those with higher exposure to low rated instruments.

This instability has claimed its first casualty in debt mutual funds...

Franklin Templeton Mutual Fund (FTMF) has decided to wind down six of its debt schemes with effect from April 23, 2020 due to COVID-19 related market dislocation. This is something that is unheard of in the mutual fund industry and has perplexed many investors and advisors.

The schemes that are wound up are:

• Franklin India Low Duration Fund
• Franklin India Dynamic Accrual Fund
• Franklin India Credit Risk Fund
• Franklin India Short Term Income Plan
• Franklin India Ultra Short Bond Fund
• Franklin India Income Opportunities Fund

Together these schemes have an AUM of 30,854 crore as on March 31, 2020. Notably, these are the very schemes which in the past had to create segregated portfolio for its exposure to downgraded papers of Vodafone Idea and Yes Bank.

What led to the move?

According to a statement to investors from FTMF, "Despite several measures taken by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the liquidity in certain segments of the corporate bond markets has fallen-off dramatically and has remained low for an extended period. In this scenario, mutual funds are facing unprecedented liquidity challenges due to a variety of factors-rising redemption pressures due to heightened risk aversion, mark to market losses following a spike in yields and lower trading volumes in the bond markets. These factors have together caused a significant and worsening liquidity crunch for open-end mutual fund schemes investing in corporate credits across the credit rating spectrum."

The schemes had to resort to continuous borrowing to fund redemptions during this time, and were unable to repay the borrowings through sale of portfolio securities due to the prevailing market environment. The Investment manager did not believe it was prudent to continue funding redemptions through potentially increasing levels of borrowings.

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FTMF follows a high-risk high-return strategy for the above mentioned funds - Meaning a major part of its portfolio is exposed to lower rated securities (rating below AAA). The market disruption due to the virus outbreak has impacted these securities the most.

Under conditions of high redemption pressure, mutual funds sell their liquid assets to meet the demand, leaving the portfolio highly exposed to illiquid assets.

Thus, investors who choose to stay invested are at a disadvantage here.

Anticipating continued liquidity stress to the funds, the fund house thought winding up the scheme is the only viable option for the unitholders to minimize erosion of value.

Table: Details of schemes being wound up

What does it mean for investors of these schemes?

Investors of these schemes will not be able to purchase/redeem investment, switch to other schemes or do systematic transactions. In short their funds will be locked. The fund will not charge any management fees for the funds that are being wound up.

The fund house will rely on coupon payments, maturity value of underlying securities, and selling of securities at realisable value. While the fund house expects to realise most of the proceeds as per maturities, there may be some low rated securities that may even default on the due date. The fund house may create segregated portfolios for such securities and pay back as and when the money is realised.

It will be prudent to check the average maturity of portfolios of each fund and expect major repayment within that period.

What should investors in debt funds do?

Debt mutual fund Investors are not as confident, due to incidents of exposure to toxic papers in the past. This event could make them even more wary about their investment in debt schemes. As a consequence, there may be some panic selling in other debt schemes by investors worried about their funds getting locked.

However, instead of taking any hasty decisions, it would be a great idea to check your funds for the quality of assets it holds.

Choose a fund house that follows prudent investment process and stringent risk-management system. In these uncertain times, it would be wise sticking to liquid funds and overnight funds for the fixed-income part of your portfolio. Alternatively, if you prefer safety of capital, invest in Bank fixed deposits.

Our friends at Quantum Mutual Fund have highlighted the secret behind their debt management strategy which has helped them provide safety and liquidity to investors when it comes to investing in quantum funds. Don't Worry, Quantum Liquid Fund always aims for Safety and Liquidity

The way ahead...

While the fund house has done this to protect investors' interest, it has made the funds illiquid from the investors' point of view. Many investors may lose faith in debt funds for their short-term goals.

Going further, investors may have to consider liquidity risk due to AMC action, while investing in any high credit risk oriented debt funds.

It is time for the regulator to step up and clarify the illiquidity part for other debt schemes out there to investors. Moreover, it needs to provide a framework of strict guidelines to restrict fund managers from putting investors' hard-earned money at risk by exposing them to low rated securities for higher yield.

Meanwhile, AMFI has assured investors that a majority of the fixed income fund assets is invested in superior credit quality securities, and the schemes have appropriate liquidity to ensure normal operations. It further stated that the industry remains fully committed to the investors' interests and there is no need for them to panic and redeem investments.

Author: Divya Grover

This article first appeared on PersonalFN here.

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PersonalFN is a Mumbai based personal finance firm offering Financial Planning and Mutual Fund Research services.

Disclaimer:
The views mentioned above are of the author only. Data and charts, if used, in the article have been sourced from available information and have not been authenticated by any statutory authority. The author and Equitymaster do not claim it to be accurate nor accept any responsibility for the same. The views constitute only the opinions and do not constitute any guidelines or recommendation on any course of action to be followed by the reader. Please read the detailed Terms of Use of the web site.

Many investors park their surplus money in debt schemes in an attempt to earn higher returns than Bank FDs. However the recent incident of Franklin Templeton MF winding down six of its debt schemes has dented investor sentiment and sparked speculation about the safety of their investments.

The news came as a shocker to the investors because the six schemes, the fund house, and the fund manager had a good performance record. Investors in the wound up debt schemes of FTMF are now left with no choice but to wait for the fund house make repayments.

If you are one of them, surely you want to know about the timeline of payouts from the respective schemes.

Here is what you should know first...

Before returning the money to unitholders, the fund will have to repay the borrowings by the respective schemes that was taken to fund the heightened level of redemptions. Keep in mind that the repayment of borrowings does not impact the value of money to be returned to the unit holders, though it can delay the start of pay out to unitholders.

The repayment of the borrowings that the fund has taken, along with the cash flows it receives in the respective schemes based on the maturity of the underlying securities in the portfolio as well as coupon receipts will determine the payout to the unitholders.

Moreover, the fund will seek pre-payment from issuers of the underlying securities and will look to sell portfolio holdings in secondary market at fair value.

Table 1: Maturity profile of wound up FTMF schemes

Franklin India Ultra Short Bond Fund (FIUBF) and Franklin India Low Duration Fund (FILDF) are the schemes with shorter maturity. If you are an investor in this scheme, you may expect a significant payout within 2-3 years. However, to recover the entire amount you may have to wait up to 5 years.

If you are wondering why a scheme with average maturity of just 0.44 years and 1.45 years will take around 5 years to repay the entire amount?

This is because the maturity of some underlying securities is much longer (around 4-5 years), even though the schemes belong to low duration category. Additionally, the schemes have borrowings in the range of 6.5% and 8.5% respectively, which have to be repaid first.

Whereas, if you are an investor in Franklin India Dynamic Accrual Fund (FIDA), Franklin India Short Term Income Fund (FISTIP), Franklin India Credit Risk Fund (FICRF), and Franklin India Income Opportunities Fund (FIIOF) your wait will be longer. These schemes primarily invest in medium to long duration securities.

These funds had to sell a number of their short term and liquid securities in the portfolio to meet redemptions. Hence, to get a significant payout from these schemes you will have to wait at least 4-5 years. The year wise expected cumulative cash flows is given in the table below.

Notably, FIIOF is the longest duration fund from among the six funds that have been wound up. It will only be able to repay a very small portion (5%) in the next two years.

Another key reason that could delay the payout from these schemes is the high borrowing rate. FISTIP has 28% of its assets as borrowings, FIIOF has 26%; while FICRF also has significant 16% as borrowings. Furthermore, factors such as credit issues or payment delays faced by any of the investee companies could negatively impact cash flows.

Table 2: Cash flows expected by FTMF across different time period

Many of the securities with longer maturities have regular interim cash flows and features such as interest rate resets or call/ put options, which significantly reduce the effective maturity and the same has been factored into the calculation of the Macaulay Duration.

FTMF said that it would actively explore opportunities with a goal to facilitate repayment prior to the maturity of the portfolio investments. To do this it will seek prepayment from the issuers of the underlying securities and look to sell the securities in the secondary market.

However, the current market scenario is rife with risk aversion and illiquidity. The fact that wound up schemes have high holding of lower rated securities, FTMF will have to wait for the market conditions to go back to normal to liquidate the portfolio at the earliest, without causing value erosion for investors.

[Read: RBI Steps in to Take Some Pain Off Mutual Funds. Will It Help?]

Way ahead for debt fund investors

Keep in mind that debt funds are not risk-free. Investment in debt funds carry various risks relating to liquidity, credit quality, and interest rate. Therefore, before investing in debt funds understand the various risks involved and invest in schemes where the portfolio risk aligns with your own risk appetite and financial objective.

In this market environment, it would be preferable to invest in instruments issued by government and public sector enterprises, and stay away from those having high exposure to private issuers.

At PersonalFN, we arrive at top rated funds using our SMART Score Model. If you wish to select worthy mutual fund schemes, I recommend you to subscribe to PersonalFN's unbiased premium research service, FundSelect.

Additionally, as a bonus, you get access to PersonalFN's popular debt mutual fund service, DebtSelect.

If you are serious about investing in a rewarding mutual fund scheme, Subscribe now!

Author: Divya Grover

This article first appeared on PersonalFN here.

Join Now: PersonalFN is now on Telegram. Join FREE Today to get 'Daily Wealth Letter' and Exclusive Updates on Mutual Funds

PersonalFN is a Mumbai based personal finance firm offering Financial Planning and Mutual Fund Research services.

Disclaimer:
The views mentioned above are of the author only. Data and charts, if used, in the article have been sourced from available information and have not been authenticated by any statutory authority. The author and Equitymaster do not claim it to be accurate nor accept any responsibility for the same. The views constitute only the opinions and do not constitute any guidelines or recommendation on any course of action to be followed by the reader. Please read the detailed Terms of Use of the web site.

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In April, Franklin Templeton India shut down six debt funds, locking in ₹30,800 crore of investor wealth after a surge in redemptions.Explaining the reason behind this, Franklin Templeton CEO Jennifer M Johnson said that this is a liquidity issue and not a solvency issue.Franklin Templeton India’s assets under management (AUM) declined by almost 43% – from $7 billion to $4 billion.Franklin Templeton India, one of the oldest asset management companies (AMC) in the country, decided to wind down six debt funds amounting to ₹30,800 crore in investor wealth. Now, in an earnings call, Franklin Templeton President and CEO Jennifer M Johnson has explained what exactly went wrong with its India business.“We're doing everything we can for those shareholders, to make sure they get all their money back.

It has laid hidden for over 2,200 years, but during routine drilling work the long-lost temple Pharaoh Ptolemy IV is believed to have been found in a city located on the west bank of the Nile River.

According to the Bible, the Jewish people were prohibited from worshipping outside of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem - and the other 'high places' of worship were destroyed.

The temple, from about the 12th century BC, was once part of the biblical Canaanite city of Lachish - a powerful stronghold - now the area houses the Tel Lachish national park.

The board of the £509million Temple Bar investment trust has served notice to its manager Ninety One, after portfolio manager Alastair Mundy stepped down for health reasons.

A specially constituted bench of CJI Dipak Misra and Justices Ashok Bhushan and Abdul Nazeer will be hearing a total of 13 appeals filed against the 2010 Allahabad High Court judgement.

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Here's a selection of Business Standard opinion pieces of the day

"In the Varadaraja Swamy Temple in Kanchipuram, I saw with my own eyes, just a year ago, how the late 17th-century murals were literally disintegrating. As you watch, they are going. It has happened in temple after temple". David Shulman talks to Lalitha Sridhar .

An Indian-origin man has been sentenced to 52 weeks' imprisonment after pleading guilty to writing offensive graffiti at a number of locations across Leicester in central England, some of which was deemed to be racially or religiously aggravated. Amit Divecha admitted to being responsible for the graffiti, which was found outside a Hindu temple.

Franklin Templeton Mutual Fund on Friday issued an unconditional apology to market regulator Sebi (Securities and Exchange Board of India) for remarks made by its president and CEO Jennifer M Johnson that new regulatory guidelines led to shutting down of its six debt funds last month.