WhiteOak Capital kicks off NFO season with flexi cap fund
1 min read 07 Jul 2022, 11:34 PM ISTThe NFO opens on 12 July, and is the first open-ended one to be announced after the market regulator banned fund houses from launching new schemes until systems were put in place to stop pooling of funds and mutual fund units
PremiumWhiteOak Capital Mutual Fund has announced the launch of its first equity new fund offer (NFO), the WhiteOak Capital Flexi Cap Fund.
The NFO opens on 12 July, and is the first open-ended one to be announced after the market regulator—Securities and Exchange Board of India—banned fund houses from launching new schemes until systems were put in place to stop pooling of funds and mutual fund units.
Fund strategy
As a flexi cap fund, the WhiteOak Capital fund will invest 65% or more of its net assets in equity—large, mid and small stocks.
According to the AMC (asset management company), the fund will focus on building a well-balanced portfolio that can perform across market cycles with no bias towards any specific market cap, investment style or sector.
Prateek Pant, chief business officer, WhiteOak Capital Mutual Fund, highlighted that it is impossible to predict which sector, style (value, growth, momentum, for example) and market cap will outperform and when that will happen. The fund will remain fully invested and will not take cash calls. It will invest in “great businesses at attractive valuations". To gauge valuations, the AMC will not go by traditional valuations such as price-to-earnings multiples. It will rely on WhiteOak Capital’s proprietary, cash flow based ‘Opco-Finco’ analytical and valuation framework to select stocks that are trading at a discount to their intrinsic value.
The fund will focus on a bottoms-up stock selection approach and will not go for top-down sector bets based on macroeconomic factors.
The WhiteOak Capital Group was set up in June 2017 and manages ₹40,812 crore worth of Indian equity assets for global and Indian investors today. The group acquired the mutual fund business of Yes Bank in November 2021 comprising an overnight fund, a liquid fund and an ultra short term fund.
“While WhiteOak Capital has built up a good track record managing monies as a portfolio manager, the flexicap category has multiple options with excellent track records. Thus, investors may wait for a similar track record to be built here before allocating monies", says Vishal Dhawan, founder and CEO, Plan Ahead Wealth Advisors.
