Moneycontrol Mutual Fund Summit 2026 highlights governance and market discipline in Ahmedabad

New Delhi: The third edition of the Moneycontrol Mutual Fund Summit 2026 was held in Ahmedabad on February 17, bringing together senior figures from India’s asset management industry, including regulators, chief investment officers and wealth advisers.

Centred on the theme “Scaling Participation. Sustaining Performance”, the discussions focused on the development of India’s savings and capital markets, governance standards, asset allocation strategies and the evolving investment landscape.

Amarjeet Singh, Whole-Time Member of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), said the mutual fund industry had made notable progress in building an equity culture over the past three decades but cautioned that rapid expansion must be accompanied by stronger oversight.

“We’ve come a long way, which we need to celebrate.” However, he cautioned about emerging risks. “We need to consolidate the growth that we have seen. We should make sure that there is no big mishap which drives investors away,” he said.

Sessions at the summit examined portfolio construction across asset classes, including equities, debt and gold, alongside the assessment of initial public offerings and the implications of global access through GIFT City.

In a panel on tactical allocation for 2026, Ashish Gupta, Chief Investment Officer at Axis Mutual Fund, said that expectations for equity returns should be moderated in the current macroeconomic environment.

“If your expectations are reasonable, then it should still be a reasonable year for equities,” he said, noting that some valuation pressures had eased as earnings stabilised. However, he pointed to global uncertainties, uneven capital flows and a large pipeline of IPOs as factors that could limit upside. “It will be a year of modest gain,” he said.

During a fireside chat, Navneet Munot, Managing Director and Chief Executive of HDFC Asset Management Company, reflected on long-term investing and investor conduct.

“Long-term success in investing is not about how much you know. It’s about how you behave,” he said, adding that information overload can create overconfidence. 

“Across cycles, crises and volatility, the secret to success has been remaining disciplined. Just stay the course,” Munot said.

Another discussion focused on the International Financial Services Centre at GIFT City. Pradeep Ramakrishnan, Executive Director at the International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA), said neutrality in capital flows is essential for an international financial centre.

"An International Financial Centre must remain neutral to both inflows and outflows, and that is the direction being pursued," he said. He noted that capital now flows into the GIFT ecosystem from nearly 70 countries and is deployed across close to 30 countries.

Other speakers included senior executives from Sundaram AMC, ITI AMC, Invesco AMC, Edelweiss Asset Management, Quantum AMC and Motilal Oswal AMC, who discussed product innovation, sectoral themes and investor participation trends.