According to reports from CNBC TV18, Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC manages funds worth ₹68.66 billion as of July-end and maintains a positive stance on equities. Harish Krishnan, CIO – Equity, noted that more than half of the top 500 listed companies are now growing earnings at over 15%, compared with nearly one-third about 18 months ago. The proportion of companies trading above 50 times earnings has declined from peak levels, indicating that some excess valuations have eased.
As reported by CNBC TV18, the fund house remains cautious on three specific sectors. The first is the capital markets ecosystem, where increased competition and a surge in listed companies could limit profitability. Second is defence, where strong order books are being offset by stretched working capital requirements. Third is capital goods companies benefiting from the AI investment theme, where institutional ownership has become very high. Krishnan stated that if these three spaces are excluded, value can be found in most other market aspects.
According to the report, Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC follows a 'good-to-great' investment framework that identifies companies gaining market share through differentiated execution. Krishnan emphasized this is a market for micro investments, focusing on bottoms-up identification of franchises transitioning from good to great. The fund house has participated in only about 20% of IPOs over the past two to three years, with only around 30% of IPOs outperforming the Nifty 500 by more than five percentage points after listing.
As reported by CNBC TV18, the fund house highlights new-age businesses as one of its preferred themes, including companies in consumer technology, fintech and electric vehicles (EVs) that could benefit as artificial intelligence improves productivity and lowers engineering costs. Krishnan also identified chemicals and auto ancillary companies as areas where the investment team continues to find opportunities, supported by import substitution, export growth and India's free trade agreements. He cited examples across insurance, airports, IT and auto ancillaries, noting that sector-wide weakness often creates opportunities to accumulate stronger companies at more attractive valuations.
According to the report, Krishnan explained the fund house's selective IPO approach, stating that rather than investing across every public issue, the strategy focuses on taking meaningful positions only in businesses where the team has high conviction and sees long-term value creation. He also explained why Lenskart remains a core holding despite its strong post-listing performance, noting the company has executed well and could emerge as one of India's multinational companies with AI-driven use cases.
