When most savvy investors are shunning mid-cap companies, fund manager Kenneth Andrade has just begun a buying spree
Every morning around 8:30, Kenneth Andrade is usually among the first employees to walk into the plush IDFC Mutual Fund office at Indiabulls Centre in Mumbai’s Lower Parel. The 42-year-old chief investment officer tends to be a loner, who keeps to himself and prefers not to interfere with other people’s work.
Of late though, his colleagues say Andrade has become a bit more aloof, choosing to retreat inside his cabin on the sixth floor. There, he stays put for hours, poring over a set of historical charts. For casual observers, it would seem as if Andrade is on a new secret mission.
And they wouldn’t be far off the mark. The crack fund manager is entering an intensely critical phase in his career — one that could determine the future of the IDFC Premier Fund, the country’s most successful mid-cap fund. With a corpus of Rs. 2,000 crore, IDFC Premier is the second biggest in its genre. At 16 percent annually for the past three years, its returns have been more consistent and better than the Goliath in the space, Reliance Growth Fund, and significantly more than the measly five percent which the BSE 500 has generated.
Over the past five years, the consistent superior performance of the IDFC Premier Fund has also built a formidable reputation for Andrade as a mid-cap specialist. He manages around Rs. 5,000 crore of equity for IDFC Mutual Fund which has a size of Rs. 21,000 crore.
Given the high degree of concentration risk, most seasoned market players are following his moves very closely to see if his winning streak will sustain. “Kenneth is probably the best example of the rational contrarian in the Indian mutual fund industry. His methods are typified by keen attention to details. He has a highly disciplined approach to stock selection and the belief that risk adjusted value triumphs in the long run,” says Sanjoy Bhattacharya, Partner, Fortuna Capital and a Forbes India columnist.
Patience Has Its Rewards
(This story appears in the 17 June, 2011 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)