Stock market woes, regulatory woes and more have combined to make India "a miserable disappointment" for some U.S. mutual fund firms, like the soon-to-depart Fidelity [profile] [see MFWire.com, 3/28/2012]. Michael Shari of Barron's highlighted the various challenges facing fundsters in a country that is three times the size of the United States but has one percent of the U.S.'s mutual fund assets.

Regulatory interference plays a big part. Barron's noted that, in 2009, the Indian equivalent to the SEC suddenly banned all sales loads, eliminating banks' incentives to sell any non-proprietary mutual funds and thus requiring mutual fund firms to partner with banks to gain any distribution. And the Unit Trust of India Asset Management where, T. Rowe Price [profile] owns a substantial stake, remains leadersless thanks to the Finance Ministry rejecting the favored candidate. The chairman of the business quit in February 2011.

On the flip side of Fidelity and T. Rowe, Barron's saw the $7-billion-AUM $4.3-billion-AUM Franklin Templeton [profile] and BlackRock [profile] India affiliates, respectively, weathering regulatory ripples and stock market turmoil. And the pub noted that another U.S. fund firm, Goldman Sachs [profile], is "on the cusp" of launching its first Indian retail mutual fund after buying institutional ETF manager Benchmark Asset Management in July of last year. 

Edited by: HFD


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