Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC Limited (ABSLAMC) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Aditya Birla Sun Life Asset Management Q4 and FY '25 Earnings Conference Call hosted by InCred Equities. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Ms. Meghna Luthra from InCred Equities. Thank you and over to you, ma'am.

Thank you, Manav. Good evening, everyone. On behalf of InCred Equities, I welcome all to Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC Fourth Quarter FY '25 Earnings Conference Call. We have along with us Mr. A. Balasubramanian, Managing Director and CEO, along with the senior management of the company. We are thankful to the management for following us this opportunity. I would now like to hand it over to Mr. A. Balasubramanian for his opening remarks. Over to you, sir.

Yes, thanks, Meghna for the introduction. Good morning, everyone and thank you for joining today's investors call. I trust you all had the opportunity to review our earnings presentation which is available on both the stock exchange and our website. Let me begin with the economic outlook very quickly and update on the mutual fund industry. The global macroeconomic outlook for the new financial year suggests a continuation of moderate but uneven growth, with a projection around 3.3% for the global economy. Inflation is expected to moderate further with the global headline inflation potentially falling to 4.2% and key risks still persist, including the geopolitical tensions and potential for increased trade restrictions and macroeconomic volatility stemming from unexpected economic shifts or the policy changes there. Central banks are expected to remain vigilant, calibrating monitory policy cautiously, especially in the U.S., while fiscal policy will need to focus on long-term stability and growth-enhancing measures. India's macroeconomic outlook remains strong, with the GDP growth projected at about 6.5%. This robust expansion is driven by sustained domestic demand, rising government capital expenditures and gradual easing of inflation. While global risk, particularly from the U.S. trade policies could affect exports, India's limited reliance on the external markets provide significant insulation. Inflation is expected to average about 4.1% for the fiscal year. Giving the RBI flexibility for potential rate cut, the fiscal deficit is targeted to decline to about 4.4% of GDP, reinforcing the government's commitment to fiscal consolidation. Overall, India is poised for continued growth, though the global risk and the need for sustained private investment warrant careful monitoring. The recent positive turnaround in the Indian stock market with indices like the NIFTY 50 and Sensex rebounding in March '25 face a significant headwind due to the potential impact of the newly implemented Trump tariffs. However, domestic optimism returning from foreign investments, reasonable valuations and signs of economic recovery, provide the necessary support for our market. Additionally, India is actively pursuing a trade deal with the U.S. to secure favorable terms and minimize the potential disruptions. And hopefully, it happens soon for the benefit of our economic growth. Moving to the Indian financial -- Indian mutual fund industry. The quarterly average AUM of mutual fund industry as on March 31, 2025 stood at INR 67.4 lakh crores as compared to INR 54.1 lakh crores as of March 2024, growing by 25% on a year-on-year basis. Due to recent volatility in the equity markets, Q4 FY '25 saw a slowdown in equity net sales compared to the previous quarter. Equity net sales for Q4 FY '25 were around INR 121,000 crores versus INR 162,000 crores in Q3 FY '25. The total NFO collection for Q4 FY '25 also experienced a decline totaling to about INR 12,700 crores with INR 8,500 crores coming from equity and rest of the money is coming from fixed income. And mainly the equity flows are from the sectoral and thematic funds and small cap funds, especially in the NFO collections. While industry SIP inflows registered around year-on-year growth of 35% with 10 crore accounts contributing to approximately INR 25,900 crores in March 2025, it witnessed a marginal decline on a quarter-on-quarter basis. The total number of mutual fund folios stood around 23.8 crores with a year-on-year increase of 32%. The individual average AUM for March '25 grew by about 21% year-on-year from INR 33.31 lakh crores to INR 40.31 lakh crores and contributed 60% of total AUM. B-30 cities with an average AUM of INR 12.17 lakh crores for March 2025 accounted for 18% of the total mutual fund AUM. At Aditya Birla Sun Life AMC, I'm pleased to share that we observed positive momentum in sales, driven by improved investment performance and strong on the ground level engagement from our sales team. This has also resulted in quarter-on-quarter increase in our AUM and market share. As part of our ongoing engagement, this quarter, we also hosted an exclusive event, Vantage Point 2025, which brought together the country's top MFDs. The event was pivotal in strengthening our relationship and fostering deeper collaboration with these key partners in order to increase our engagement as well as market share. It has, in fact, enabled them to better advise their investors with tailored investment solutions suited to the evolving market dynamics. Our overall average assets under management, including alternate assets stood at INR 4.06 lakh crores, reflecting a 17% year-on-year growth. Our mutual fund quarterly average AUM reached to INR 3.82 lakh crores, growing 15% year-on-year. The quarterly equity average AUM stood at INR 1.69 lakh crores, growing by 11% year-on-year. Our SIP book for March '25 stood at INR 1,316 crores and we added about 5.43 lakh new SIPs in Q4 FY '25. Our total investor folio stood at INR 1.06 crores with around 27 lakh new folios added during the FY '25. On the alternate business front, we are continuously enhancing our PMS and AIF offering across both equity and fixed income to better serve the evolving needs of HNIs and family offices. Following the receipt of the ESIC mandate, we commenced the management of debt portfolio and AUM stood about INR 7,456 crores for the quarter ended March 31, 2025. Consequently our PMS/AIF witnessed a year-on-year growth of 268% rising from INR 3,075 crores to INR 11,330 crores. Additionally, we're also preparing to launch the ABSL Equity Innovation Fund under the PMS category. Our offshore assets grew by 14% from INR 10,545 crores to INR 12,070 crores. Under the GIFT City platform, we had our final closure of the ABSL Global Emerging Market Equity Fund under the LRS scheme with AUM of about USD 65 million. Fundraising is underway for India ESG Engagement Fund, ABSL Flexicap Fund for inward remittance and ABSL Global Bluechip Fund under LRS schemes for outward remittance. Aligned with our vision to scale in passives business, we continue to offer a diverse and performance-driven product to investors. As of March 2025, our total passive assets reached approximately INR 34,700 crores with a growing customer base exceeding 11.6 lakh folios. Our current product suite comprises 53 distinct offerings designed to meet varied investment needs of the customers with the mix of equity and fixed income index funds. Moving on to the financials. We at ABSL AMC have achieved profit after tax of INR 931 crores in FY '25, which is up 19% year-on-year. For FY 2025, our operating revenue is at INR 1,685 crores, up 25% year-on-year and total revenue is INR 1,986 crores, up 21% year-on-year. Operating profit before tax is at INR 944 crores, up 31% year-on-year and profit before tax is INR 1,248 crores, up 25% year-on-year. In Q4 FY '24, our operating revenue is at INR 429 crores, up 17% year-on-year. Total revenue is INR 501 crores, up 14% year-on-year. Q4 FY '24 operating profit before tax is at INR 233 crores, up 21% year-on-year and profit before tax is at INR 305 crores, up 14% year-on-year. We are pleased to announce that the Board has proposed a dividend of INR 24 per share, which is up from the last time what we have declared for the year FY 2025. With this, I would like to conclude and open the floor for any questions.

[Operator Instructions] We have our first question from the line of Swarna Mukherjee from B&K Securities.

I had 3, 4 questions from my side. First one is on the employee expense part. So this quarter, the employee expense had kind of increased sequentially. So I wanted to understand what factors drove these expenses? And if there was, say, a higher variable payout baked into this, how do we account for it? Do we do it on a quarterly basis? Or is it that you account it on an actual basis in a particular quarter? So if you could give some color on that? And how should we think about this number in the upcoming quarters as we move into FY '26? That is the first question. Second is on the ESIC mandate that we have gotten, if you could give some details on what would be the realizations on that? And is this primarily a debt-oriented mandate that we have largely execution driven, if you could highlight that? And thirdly, when I look at your SIP data, I think what I see is that the number of live SIPs have also come off. So I just wanted to understand that last year, we had kind of significantly increased our share towards the direct channel, particularly the online-oriented channel. Is this leading to some amount of closures in our SIP book? Or if you could highlight what the trends are? And given that SIP flows have also come off from what it was in December. So is this -- I mean what is our approach towards that if you would expect this number to kind of now move northwards as the market has started to also improve. These will be my questions, sir. And I have a couple of bookkeeping questions, which I'll possibly ask after your response.

Thanks, Swarna Mukherjee. I'll take the second question, which is the ESIC mandate. This is basically debt-oriented mandate advisory under the portfolio management service. Of course, as you know, this government mandate comes with the lowest possible rate. It's more of a prestigious mandate for us. While we have been in this market for long and for a variety of reasons, we were not participating in this segment. But given the fact that we have the people who can actually provide related service to managing this fund. So this year, we bid for it and we got qualified and therefore, we won the mandate. And ideally speaking, the amount could be in the range of about INR 44,000 crores, INR 45,000 crores on the base of the sharing formula that they have with all others. So that's something. Of course, here, we are building it up and we only believe winning this kind of mandate can only help us expanding this advisory service to many others, both government and private institutions. And that's something basis which we have won this mandate. I'm happy to share that it's ready. We already got the money and started investing in that. As far as the SIP data concerns, I'll leave the exact numbers to Prakash. With respect to the SIPs while we have been clearly focusing on increasing SIP, as you would have seen last few quarters, each quarter, we keep improving number. We touched almost about INR 1,400 crores kind of SIP number, and then we saw some bit of dip. I think largely on account of 2 things. One, of course, during the current quarter, generally, we have seen SIP both registrations and the net additions have come down for the industry, and we are also more in line with that. Also, given the fact that the SIP generally is where money comes in and -- in the form of SIP. And during the current volatility period, some of the SIP transactions also got stopped. As a result of that number shows a little lower. But otherwise, our focus in terms of building SIP, I think, remains paramount to us. Even some of these promotions that we are doing, the Sabse Important Plan is SIP that we are going aggressive in terms of promoting it. And incentivization also is actually -- it sets the target and incentization is also large on the basis of that. And in fact, our fund performance showing an improvement across the major categories. We're also quite confident that SIP, we should start seeing the improvement coming in. SIP target, I don't give a target number, given the fact that becomes a projection. But otherwise, clearly, the focus is there to build our equity through the SIP that stays constant. As far as employee expense is concerned, I'll ask Pradeep.

Yes. So Mr. Swarna Mukherjee, actually employee count, if you see from a quarter-on-quarter basis, it has not increased much. It is only in the same range, 1,627 to 1,628 only. However, we are in the process of building our direct team to 30 to 40 additional people. But that is not going to actually impact much on the cost part.

Right, sir. Sorry, I missed the 1,620 to 1,630 number, sir. You must be talking about the overall expenses. So if I heard this correctly, the employee expenses have moved up from around INR 88 crores to almost INR 99 crores. So I mean I just wanted to understand that INR 10 crore kind of increase.

Yes, so Swarna, so our employee expenses for the quarter-on-quarter has increased by INR 11 crores from INR 88 crores to INR 99 crores, which is largely on account of the bonus provisions and the staff welfare expenses. You wanted to know about the bonus provision. So because it's a formula at the year-end basis, the performance of the entire organization, we make the provision for the bonus and that has increased a little bit because of which you can see some increase in the overall employee expenses.

Okay. Sir, understood. So then next quarter, it will again kind of normalize a little bit?

Yes. Yes. Yes. Again, from the financial year, the new provisions will start basis the achievement what we will have that time.

Okay. And would it be fair to build in like maybe 10-odd percent kind of a inflation in the fixed part?

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes, I mean, broadly just to give you a sense on this employee expense, generally, we have the fixed cost plus variable cost. And variable cost is largely linked to the performance of each of the functions as well as the company's overall function, overall achievement. And therefore, these provisions will keep changing. And I think wherever -- in fact, last quarter was better than the previous quarter. Therefore, as a result of that, we have to make a little higher provision. Otherwise, sometimes it's a good problem to have.

So basically, just to add, actually, there would be some quarter-on-quarter fluctuation. But on -- if you see on a year-on-year basis, it's largely in line.

Yes.

Okay, sir, understood. Very helpful. A couple of bookkeeping questions. If you could provide the SIP AUM number and yields by the different asset classes, that would be very helpful, sir.

SIP AUM is INR 75,600 crores. So Swarnabha, SIP AUM is INR 75,600 crores.

Okay, sir. And if you could give the yields by the different asset classes.

So equity is in the range of around [ 68 , 69 ] -- yield. He want yield. Yes, that is in the range of around [ 24, 25 ] and liquid is in the range of around 12 to 13 basis points.

We have our next question from the line of Prayesh Jain from Motilal Oswal Financial Services.

Just a few questions. Firstly, if I look at your yield this quarter, sequentially, we basically divide the revenue by your MF AUM. That's kind of come off in this quarter. That's primarily because of the share of equity going down or what kind of -- or what would you attribute that to? That is first. Secondly, you mentioned in your opening remarks, sir, that the flow momentum has been strong given the fund performance has improved. Could you just help us understand what has been your -- directionally, what has been your flow market share -- inflow market share in the last few months? Thirdly, you had -- in our earlier interactions or analyst meet, I think you had mentioned about an agency to kind of evaluate the funds. And where are we in that process right now? Yes, those would be my questions.

Yes, I think with respect to the revenue drop was largely on account of equity mix. Equity mix has dropped by about 1.5% compared to the previous quarter. As a result of that, equity mix is getting reduced. The revenue has dropped. Therefore, the number what you are saying is derived from that. As far as the fund performance impact, across all over the main categories right from Frontline Equity, Flexi Cap Fund, Balanced Advantage Fund, Multi Cap fund and some of these thematic funds. We are seeing improvement coming in. And in fact, our sales on these funds, in fact, I was seeing it today only and generally, how the numbers are even coming in month of April. These numbers are now getting positive. Normally, the way we have been addressing last 2 -- last 1, 1.5 years, our rate of fall has to come down. That we have witnessed in the last quarter. The rate of market share loss has been coming down quarter-on-quarter basis. Second, largely performing funds should also come as part of the recommendation list that we are -- something we are now seeing some of our funds which are performing well now is coming as part of the recommendation list in some of these organized channels. In fact, the sales team is also driving 5 focused products and all 5 focused products are in the Q1, Q2 and that's being -- not only being seen, people are also talking about it in terms of our fund performance coming back, is something making them -- making our partners to contribute more for the AUM success in the current financial year. That's something we are already seeing it. In the last quarter, we are seeing some -- a little bit of flows coming into the -- in those funds. And last question is around -- which is your third question? Yes, that I mentioned, yes. Prayesh?

Yes, sir, I was talking about the consultant that you hired to improve the -- to evaluate the funds and...

Yes, I got it. No, no. We engaged with Mercer about 2 years back when Harish Krishnan joined as Head of Equity. They have already initiated discussion with Mercer to help us to understand the current processes, what are things need to be improved. In fact, those input has been taken by the new Head of Equity and implemented some of the process changes that they implemented in the fund house in terms of tracking of our ownership, stock selection and our ownership of stocks and sizing of those opportunities in the portfolio reflection and also monitoring the performance very closely, where we have also put a target that we should not have any funds, which is in Q4, we should try and keep all the funds in Q1, Q2 performance. And not necessarily everything has been in Q1. In fact, 65% of our funds have delivered Q1, Q2 performance for March ending on a 1, 1.5 years basis. So I think this has come largely on the back of the Mercer engagement that we did, which has now been built in as part of the overall process. Of course, in addition to that, whatever suggestions that came, the new team, which is -- not new team, except Harish and one more gentleman we recruited for a small and mid-cap, along with the other portfolio managers, the restructuring of team from a fund management responsibility point of view, allocating to individuals the portfolio responsibilities and each of them, of course, have taken it with a lot of enthusiasm and to deliver better performance, better engagement. So that is something which is reflecting. And this is something which we have learned it from Mercer suggestion. As well as the team themselves have derived in addition to that recommendation, what are the things they need to implement it, which is something, which is being driven by our Head of Equity and now is reflecting on the -- both the discipline that they are supposed to maintain on the investment processes as well as focus on delivering consistent investment performance.

All right. Just a couple of more questions. One is, where does the ESIC and PMS sit in -- is it in parent or consol -- stand-alone or consol? And secondly, the other income has seen a significant improvement despite weak equity market, is it just because of the debt part? Or what else is there that is helping the other income improve?

Yes. I'll ask Prakash to answer it.

Yes. Prayesh, the PMS income is largely -- means mainly into the stand-alone also and in consol also because it's not a separate subsidiary for us. And as you rightly pointed out, the increase in other income is largely of the debt funds because of some rate cuts, we had a benefit on that. And because of that only, there is an increase in the other income.

So basically, just clarifying, PMS and ESIC both sit in stand-alone and in terms of consolidation also appears in consolidation, right?

Yes. Yes. It is part of -- it is our subsidiary, which is not there in the stand-alone.

No. So could you clarify that in the sense, part of income is booked in stand-alone, and part is booked in the subsidiary, how would that happen?

So difference between the standalone and the consolidated is the offshore part. Offshore income is...

Is only the offshore part. Okay.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Okay. Got that.

Domestic is included. PMS is included in that, yes. Yes. It is -- because it is a division. It is not a separate company.

We have our next question from the line of Lalit Deo from Equirus Securities.

Sir, I have 2 questions. Firstly, like in the previous quarter, we have highlighted that in some of the focused funds, we are seeing that the market share in net flows were in that range of about 3% to 4%. So just wanted to understand like how has those net sales fared in those particular schemes in the last 3 to 4 months? That was my first question. And the second question is like, with respect to the alternative side, so we -- like last quarter, we had the revenue of about INR 34 crores from the alternate assets. So just wanted to understand how that -- how much revenue comes from this alternate assets in 4Q FY '25?

But I'll have the second question answered by Prakash.

Yes. So Lalit, on the alternate side, the revenue is more -- on the alternate side is around INR 32 crores, INR 33 crores, same as last quarter, which is mainly because of the volatility in the market -- equity market.

Yes. As far as your first question is concerned, Lalit, the focused fund, we are seeing an improved gross sales number, both in terms of daily transaction volume coming in, as well as in SIPs coming in. We are seeing an uptick in the gross sales volume. That's why we measure the -- as one of the parameter for measuring the productivity of individuals. Even the team communications focus as well as engagement with the channel partners, all around the focused funds. And also from fund management point of view also, they are also very clear those 5 focused funds which are agreed between the fund management team and the sales team. Also is quite conscious of these funds should grow in size. And these are the funds which deserves to be bigger than what we are today. So which is basically Frontline Equity, Flexi Cap Fund, Multi Cap Fund, Balanced Advantage Fund and GenNext Fund among the thematic category. So that's something we are seeing gross volume improving. And net sales also in these funds is improving. But I'm sure the continuous engagement can only help in improving the -- both gross sales numbers and net sales numbers.

Right, sir. And sir, just last question, sir. Based on data, what would be the ESOP cost for this quarter? And how should we look at for FY '26 and '27?

So ESOP cost for this quarter is around INR 1.3 crores. And next year, there will hardly be any ESOP cost because most of the cost has been absorbed now.

We have our next question from the line of Mohit Mangal from Centrum Broking Limited.

My first question is that in quarter 3, you said that the debt funds actually had an increase in TER. So just wanted to know in Q4 also, did we increase TER in any of our debt schemes or even equity schemes? I mean, if you can just throw any color on that?

So more or less, whatever increase we have seen in the Q3, now it's the same for Q4 also.

Okay. So it's basically static, right? Nothing has changed?

Yes.

Yes. Yes.

Okay. Next is basically in terms of the -- sir, saying about the Equity Innovation Fund. So if you can just tell me something more about it as to -- in case of any size or something, that would be helpful.

That comes under PMS, Mohit. Basically, the -- we have about 6, 7 products in that as a flagship fund, one focusing on large cap, as well as already we have an innovation fund. We are relaunching one of the innovation fund both under the AIF as well as in the PMS. That's something we'll be rolling it out this year. In PMS, we have not been focusing on new fund launches all of last year. Our focus was largely on building the size of the existing fund. And then we felt that given the good performance that we have delivered and also given the good credibility they have built in the PMS compared to the competition, there is a merit for us to launch own fund, which is basically innovation fund, companies that invest on -- a lot of money like R&D, so a lot of investment they make on innovation for the future sustainability purpose. Those would be largely the focus areas. That's something we have planned to launch in this year.

All right, that's helpful. Just last question in terms of the branch expansion if I may, if I look at '26 and '27, any particular plans to expand the branches?

See, the broader vision that we have, Mohit, is create a presence in about 543 locations. That's the broader vision. Today, we have a presence in about 300 locations, out of which 86, roughly is the emerging market location and roughly about 180, our own branches, roughly about 50 or 60 is the branches shared with Aditya Birla Capital branches. Idea is actually to keep increasing the emerging market. As the emerging market, the 85 locations as we start growing, currently we have about 5%, 5.5% market share -- sorry, 6% market share that we have in those markets. As we keep increasing the size, we normally convert them to a branch. And from there, we'll again look for new markets. We identified roughly about 130 markets, emerging markets already identified this year being our 30th year of operation. And those 30 markets will be present in the emerging markets. And existing market, we have set a target for each of the locations in the current rolling out of exercise for the coming financial year in terms of expectation from the team. Each branch location, we are keeping a target in terms of improving the market share or improving the ranking in each of the locations. That is something we monitor internally just to ensure these markets start contributing. See our historical market share in the B-30 market generally as well has been very good. And even today, our B-30 contribution is very good. But given the potential, given the brand recall that we have in these markets, we have identified about 30 locations where which we'll expand this year. But this will be one-man locations.

We have our next question from the line of Madhukar Ladha from Nuvama Wealth Management.

First, just on the yields part, there seems to be a Q-o-Q sort of pretty sizable decline. I just wanted to get a sense, have our equity yields remained stable? And could you also give us some sense of what is the yield on the alternate and offshore equity and the alternate and other offshore asset classes? So those 2 asset classes, what is the rough yield that we make or get? Second, in this alternate and other offshore segment, there is a pretty good jump in AUM this quarter. So I'm not sure -- maybe I missed this. But if you could help me understand what is driving that growth? And finally, on staff cost, we are seeing like sort of a 10% growth -- sorry, about a 13% growth Q-o-Q basis. I wanted to get a sense as to how should we look at it going into next year? And for the full year, I believe staff cost is at about INR 365 crores. So even if I were to look at it on a full year basis, maybe you could help us understand what's like the fixed cost and variable pay in this? And then what sort of growth should we assume in fixed? Yes, those would be my questions.

So on the yield question, I'll ask Prakash to answer.

So Madhukar, if you see quarter-on-quarter, there is a marginal decline in the yield, which is mainly because of the equity mix has gone down, okay? So from around 47%, we are around 45%, 46%. That is the main reason for the yields going down because equity mix has changed.

But its contribution remains the same.

Contribution is more or less same. Contribution is same. On the -- you spoke about alternate asset on the PMS and AIF side, we earn around 1%-plus. On the offshore side, from the GIFT City, again, the yields are in the same line, which is 1%-plus. And on the overall offshore business, in the range of around 30 to 40 basis points.. Coming to your staff cost question, this currently, whatever hike which you have seen in the current quarter is largely, as we have explained previously, is because of the year-end bonus provisions and some increase in the staff welfare cost, staff welfare.

Plus also, just to add to that, Madhukar, is especially this year, we had also built our team, which was budgeted at the beginning of the year in terms of beefing up our direct sales team. So now we have almost about 80 people are working in the direct sales team. And that's something has also increased the headcount when it comes to the question of direct, which is again investing for the business building in addition to the -- what Prakash mentioned about it. But in terms of our alternate asset offshore, we won one mandate. Of course, this was the last quarter, in fact. So one of the Canadian pension fund, we won mandate, roughly about $52 million. And there we are getting some decent contribution and that amount will likely to go to a little higher number as and when they feel more comfortable putting money in emerging market, especially in India. That's something we are working. And second is, this quarter, we also added that ESIC mandate, which we have won about few quarters back. And finally, the money started coming in the last quarter. Therefore, the number, when you look at it shows a 268% increase. Yes, we could have shown this separately as advisory but advisory, it comes under the PMS mandate itself. Therefore, we have added to the PMS itself. But otherwise, the PMS and minus, if you take PMS has remained static, whereas the ESIC mandate has added to the overall AUM growth.

Understood. Understood. And this -- you mentioned that the yield for the PMS/AIF it is about 1%. And that is not -- that's the gross yield? Or is that the net yield which is getting accounted for?

Net yield, that is net yield.

Net yield on the revenue.

Net yield, yes.

We have the next question from the line of Abhijeet Sakhare from Kotak Securities.

My first question was, if you could share what would be the mutual fund revenues for financial year FY '25 and a comparable number for last year as well?

So for FY '24 is in the range of around INR 1,300 crores. And currently, it's in the range of around INR 1,600 crores.

Okay. Okay. And again -- and on the yield front, if it's possible to give any indication on the -- what's the number on the fresh flow versus the older book?

You mean the yield on the fresh versus the old overbook? But on a consolidated basis, on an equity, we earn around 60 to 69 basis points.

Got it. And then...

We generally keep that as a benchmark, Abhijeet. Mainly -- even normally new assets come through the higher cost initially and then it gets -- over a period of 2 to 3 years it gets adjusted. So we normally keep a benchmark. I think the ultimate contribution from equity should be in the range of 60 and 70 basis points. That's something we keep as a benchmark. And accordingly, price it. We may probably do intermittent push to improve the overall sales numbers. So that is a broad principle on a collective basis, that's what we will target.

Got it, sir. And then last one, you mentioned about 5 focused funds. So these are frontline, balanced, multi cap, GenNext and there's one more, right?

Which is the Balanced Advantage Fund. Multi-asset and balanced advantage fund.

Multi-asset. Okay. Got it. And sir, fair to assume that all of these funds are now in a positive net flow zone?

Yes. Yes. Yes. See, the way I see, Abhijeet is the -- see, I must also admit that all of last year, we did see some kind of redemptions coming in some of the funds, very few funds were getting inflows on an overall basis. Gross volume, it will always be good. But in terms of flows we are getting bit restricted. But that's something is now -- both gross flows and net sales are now improving on these funds backed by performance, communications, narrative and a high level of engagement. And in fact, I must mention that last 1 year, 80% of the funds are within the benchmark. See, all these things are now getting recognized, noticed. And in fact, some of the segments in which we have a very strong relationship is also coming as a part of the recommendation list as well. And therefore, this engagement would only help. Second, we kept the 5 focus products. These are the products where anyway, 70% of the flows for the industry also comes. And so that's why we have kept these 5 products as a focused product in addition to other thematic products we already identified. Those will be in addition to that.

We have our next question from line of Dipanjan Ghosh from Citigroup.

Just a few questions from my side. First, I'll start with a datakeeping question. If you can give your SIP flows for the quarter and your employee count as of March 31. Now coming to the other questions, while you have mentioned incrementally sales turning positive or net sales turning positive in 3 of the equity fund categories. I just wanted to understand the fourth quarter directionally were you in the green or red in terms of overall flows? And in terms of market share, when I look at your SIP market share for the month of March, it's a little bit down compared to December marginally. So when you say that directionally, your reduction in market share losses have kind of narrowed down, is that a fair assumption that on the lump sum side, you are seeing relatively better performance, be it on gross sales or lower redemptions? And the last question is on the cost front. So obviously, you mentioned that you will be expanding the direct sales team. You have ambitions to further scale up the alternates or the non-MF business out there. So let's say, over the next 1 or 2 years, how should one think of the overall cost trajectory?

So on the first question, SIP book and this thing...

So Dipanjan, the SIP book, collection for the quarter is around INR 4,000 crores. Employee count as of March '25 is 1,628.

Yes. With respect to the SIP book concern, of course, it's -- the quarter was -- as I mentioned earlier, there was a general dip in the registration for the industry. And for us also, there was a dip. And as I mentioned SIPs, some are getting canceled this quarter. Generally, the cancel rates were a little higher than the previous quarter. But having said that, anyway, we've been having a big, big push with respect to the SIPs. The idea is actually to continue to keep that high level of focus. So 1 or 2 quarters here and there can go here and there. I don't think I should get worried given the fact that focus on building SIP remains, that too in the volatile period. That's way we are pushing it. But for the longer-term outlook, in fact, this year itself, we have kept a target of INR 1,500 crores SIP for the full year but we did about INR 1,320 crores. Therefore, we keep a little bit of higher aspiration in terms of building this number. And with the performance improvement coming in, I would also expect online platform also start contributing to the SIP success. So that's something will remain a big area of focus. And with respect to the -- your last question, which is the one?

Direct team.

Yes, direct team. The direct team, see, right now, we have about 80 people. I think idea is actually have about 100 people in direct. And in fact, what we are also doing is the sales team in general and the retail sales team as well as institutional sales team, they do have a main mutual fund target as their main focus area for them and alternate is one of the additional assets they sell. In fact, we have identified for family offices a person to come onboard. And we also have a separate team of ICs for building our alternate business. We're also increasing the KRA deliverables for the senior RMs across different parts of the market. We are dividing sales force into -- sales team into 3 parts. Somebody who is like a wealth manager can sell all products. Somebody who is not a wealth manager can sell only the mutual fund product. Therefore, accordingly, we are dividing the deliverables for each of the individuals, each of the team and market, on basis which we will build alternate assets. Again alternate assets, my own belief is, could become one of the big area of focus for 2 reasons. One is, we have launched 2 products in addition to PMS. PMS is directly linked to the equity, whereas fixed income, credit-oriented funds is something with the yields coming down, we believe credit-driven fund could be one of the credit, what you call -- the performing credit, what we call it. That's something we have set aside some target and we have been running around -- the team has been running around meeting family offices, getting size, including offshore investors. Second is credit-related real estate fund. Also they delivered -- so far, the performance have been very good. And now that is also being recognized. Investors are also now willing to accept it. Therefore, the team that we have built increasing the KRA weightage for individuals and the renewed focus in terms of high-level engagement on the basis of targeted engagement with the customers basis their wallet share. I think these are the activities should help in terms of improving the alternate business for -- over the next 2 to 3 years. And last but not the least is offshore side, as well on the last call also I mentioned we would be taking the Sun Life help to have somebody on Sun Life board to soon come, and very soon it has come, who could help us open the door in the overseas market to help us reaching out to global pension funds for winning some mandates. That also is there on the card. And probably we'll be able to give you more details in the second quarter, if not before.

Right. Sir, my question was more, does that add up to your cost pressure, be it on sales expansion or kind of scaling up the alt book.

No, no. It's basically optimizing the existing team for delivering higher product -- higher numbers.

Right. And sir, one of the questions which I had asked was, net flows for the quarter, was it in the -- has it turned into the positive -- I mean, is it in the positive category or...

It was a positive for the last quarter. In fact, last quarter, we had a net sales positive both on equity arbitrage fund. That, of course, was the whole quarter it was there, except the last few days, there was an outflow. Again, it came back in the month of April.

Ladies and gentlemen, that would be the last question for today. And I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.

Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for joining. And with this, we conclude our Q4 FY '25 earnings call. Do feel free to reach out to our IR Head, Mr. Prakash Bhogale for any queries. Thank you.

Thank you. On behalf InCred Equities, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you may now disconnect your lines.